Let's make it about Medicare

RedString said:
Why wouldn't there be the elderly, are the wealthiest segment of our population and yet they are crushing their grandchildren with the burden of their care.
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Wow...you are a bitter, bitter man...Since when are the elderly the "wealthiest segment of our population"? And what's wrong with the children and grandchildren helping out the grandparents who gave them life, raised them in good homes, educated them, and loved them?

apple0154 said:
A simple solution is when the elderly die with a truckload of money tax the inheritance. 50% right off the top. After all, they aren't going to be needing it. :)
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Forget that. Romney and lil Koch want to do away with the inheritance tax.

Dixie said:
Stop spamming threads with your repeated bullshit, Apple. This has all been presented and refuted before.

1. Mortality rate does not automatically indicate state of health care.
2. Lower cost does not indicate something is BETTER!



No, that's not it. The bill still has to be paid, the doctor still has to be compensated for his time and talent, as well as the Receptionist and other employees. This costs a great deal of money that has to be paid by someone. The government doesn't have a source of earned income, people do. The government can't pay for anything, the people do. Now... let's take your stupid theory and apply it to the Banks! Why don't we have a system where the banks are just there to hand out money to whoever needs it, whenever they need it? We all put our money in the bank, all we earn and make, and then the bank just doles it out to whoever comes along and needs some money! Wouldn't that just be a wonderful system to have? Imagine, never having to need or want for anything ever again? You just drop by the bank, grab some cash and go enjoy life! The banks are happy, they are doing record-setting business, right?

The principles of why this will not work with the Bank, are the same principles which apply to "free" nationalized health care. It's NOT FREE! We have to pay for every single penny of it! The COST of doing this, will be unbearable in the end, because it's just too stupid in principle. Like the banks handing out "free" money!
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Actually, (from someone who used to bill Medicare and Medicaid) that's the exact process. The doctors and employees are paid by the government. Of course, being the liar and fraud that you are, you wouldn't know that, would you?

RedString said:
So then there must be a beauracracy to determine who is entitled to a card and to ensure they are not abusing the system. Do you intend to give the card to all inhabitants, just legal residents, citizens? Those are qualifications and someone will have to verify them.

What happens if the doctor claims he did more and overbills the plan? What if I have a pain and demand that I need more than just some aspirin, get the doctor to write me a script and turn to selling those drugs on the street? What if I just demand more extensive care, because I don't believe the doctors are properly treating me? There a lot of hypochondriacs and a lot of doctors with crappy bedside manners who treat their patients like cattle, so you can't easily dismiss either side. Second opinions increase costs and to pretend the doctors won't circle the wagons and protect their own as they do now or as teachers do now, is just naive. Second opinions would mostly be rubber stamped without any actual review of the patient.

There absolutely will be a need for a bureaucracy and we absolutely will have to deny some claims. You can continue to live in your fantasy world, where everyone is just some compliant little drone that does what he is told instead of being the strategic animals they are who will constantly look for ways to game the system, but that will never be reality.

The "fixers" with their simple solutions NEVER consider the unintended consequences. Once the system is in place it becomes very costly to change and so most suffer under these misguided solutions silently. Or as TJ put it... "Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed."
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All of that is part of Obamacare. The money savings, you know...the 700 million or whatever the republicans are claiming Obama stole from Medicare, is actually savings from cracking down on fraud.


Too bad they didn't catch Rick Scott earlier...
 
Id like to double inhertance tax if it means we can cut income tax. Lets make it more likley that hard work will get you somewhere, and less likely that lucky sperm club will.
 
Lowaicue said:
I hope the doctor helps because he has taken the hippocratic oath. If that is not his motivating force you are foolish to go to him for help.
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Do you how many people are in need of the doctor’s help? Do you realize how many people overstate their need because they are desperate for any help or don't care if it means someone else waits? A doctor has to accept that he/she is not going to be able to care for everyone. So, again, the simplistic answer is not in touch with reality.

Here is the oath. It's quite clear that its first concern is not with helping patients but rather it is about them colluding against others and potential competition (which makes the above problems worse).

I swear by Apollo the Physician and Asclepius and Hygieia and Panaceia and all the gods, and goddesses, making them my witnesses, that I will fulfill according to my ability and judgment this oath and this covenant:

To hold him who has taught me this art as equal to my parents and to live my life in partnership with him, and if he is in need of money to give him a share of mine, and to regard his offspring as equal to my brothers in male lineage and to teach them this art – if they desire to learn it – without fee and covenant; to give a share of precepts and oral instruction and all the other learning to my sons and to the sons of him who has instructed me and to pupils who have signed the covenant and have taken the oath according to medical law, but to no one else.

I will apply dietic measures for the benefit of the sick according to my ability and judgment; I will keep them from harm and injustice.

I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. In purity and holiness I will guard my life and my art.

I will not use the knife, not even on sufferers from stone, but will withdraw in favor of such men as are engaged in this work.

Whatever houses I may visit, I will come for the benefit of the sick, remaining free of all intentional injustice, of all mischief and in particular of sexual relations with both female and male persons, be they free or slaves.

What I may see or hear in the course of treatment or even outside of the treatment in regard to the life of men, which on no account one must spread abroad, I will keep myself holding such things shameful to be spoken about.

If I fulfill this oath and do not violate it, may it be granted to me to enjoy life and art, being honoured with fame among all men for all time to come; if I transgress it and swear falsely, may the opposite of all this be my lot.
 
Howey said:
Wow...you are a bitter, bitter man
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So your style is to lead with ad homs? Classy.

...Since when are the elderly the "wealthiest segment of our population"? And what's wrong with the children and grandchildren helping out the grandparents who gave them life, raised them in good homes, educated them, and loved them?
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Seriously? Are you joking?

http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/11/07/the-rising-age-gap-in-economic-well-being/


All of that is part of Obamacare. The money savings, you know...the 700 million or whatever the republicans are claiming Obama stole from Medicare, is actually savings from cracking down on fraud.
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And many of those attempts to stop fraud will lead to unintended consequeunces. My point was that it is much more complicated than what was presented. Our nation is being is harmed by people gaming this bloated system and all you guys offer is more bloat.

Most on the left are aware of the complexities but they still try to avoid the subject matter due to their lust for power. They will tell the simple minded that it is simple and they don't need to worry about anything. But, the sheep need to be scared and we need to address the problems. That's a healthy democracy, not one where they just follow blindly and don't worry about the wolves.
 
Dixie said:
I'm sorry, I am not seeing the sweeping reform legislation from Libertarians, so I guess Libertarians haven't offered any serious solution either, eh? Why should I support them politically? They've accomplished less politically than anyone, even the radical liberals.

What's that? They don't have enough political power to make changes? Well, sorry... you don't seem to want to apply that thinking to Republicans, and it does not matter that Republicans haven't had the kind of majorities needed to make radical changes, you still hold them accountable... so we can do the same with Libertarians, right?
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First off, I have credited Romney for raising the issue with the Ryan pick.

Second, I did not suggest that one should support the LP candidates, just let them be heard.

You have probably helped, in some small way, to elect many Republicans, or at least you hope to. There are thousands of Republicans who are paid to come up with policy proposals and they are paid by you and I. The LP is not staffed with many professionals and politicians that make a living off of proposing solutions. It is staffed, mostly, with volunteers who have a real job and don't get paid to write proposals that no one reads or considers.

You and I both have a right to expect that the major parties come up with policies. They are being paid handsomely to do so. You let me worry about getting something out of the LP. You have invested nothing and have no right to any return.
 
RedString said:
So your style is to lead with ad homs? Classy.



Seriously? Are you joking?

http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/11/07/the-rising-age-gap-in-economic-well-being/





And many of those attempts to stop fraud will lead to unintended consequeunces. My point was that it is much more complicated than what was presented. Our nation is being is harmed by people gaming this bloated system and all you guys offer is more bloat.

Most on the left are aware of the complexities but they still try to avoid the subject matter due to their lust for power. They will tell the simple minded that it is simple and they don't need to worry about anything. But, the sheep need to be scared and we need to address the problems. That's a healthy democracy, not one where they just follow blindly and don't worry about the wolves.
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Your chart leaves out anyone between 36 and 64, the primary wage earning years. You are as much a liar and fraud as Dicksee.
 
apple0154 said:
I never said government medical is free. It is a government service provided by taxes and it is the least expensive way to treat people and it delivers as good as or better results because illnesses are detected early before damage is done. Not all that complicated.
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So how are they going to "tax" those who pay no taxes?
 
Gawd you're dense. From HR Block:

Medicare tax might be abbreviated MWT or Med. This amount is withheld so you ´ll be covered by Medicare when you reach age 65. The amount withheld from your pay is 1.45% of your gross income. Your employer pays an additional 1.45% that doesn´t come out of your paycheck.
 
Also don't forget that boomers have payed extra into SS to cover our numbers. We also payed in and supported the 'greatest generation'...even double dippers.

Social Security is not going broke
By David Cay Johnston MAY 4, 2012

SOCIAL SECURITY | TAXES

Which federal program took in more than it spent last year, added $95 billion to its surplus and lifted 20 million Americans of all ages out of poverty?

Why, Social Security, of course, which ended 2011 with a $2.7 trillion surplus.

That surplus is almost twice the $1.4 trillion collected in personal and corporate income taxes last year. And it is projected to go on growing until 2021, the year the youngest Baby Boomers turn 67 and qualify for full old-age benefits.

So why all the talk about Social Security “going broke?” That theme filled the news after release of the latest annual report of the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Federal Disability Insurance Trust Funds, as Social Security is formally called.

The reason is that the people who want to kill Social Security have for years worked hard to persuade the young that the Social Security taxes they pay to support today’s gray hairs will do nothing for them when their own hair turns gray.

That narrative has become the conventional wisdom because it is easily reduced to a headline or sound bite. The facts, which require more nuance and detail, show that, with a few fixes, Social Security can be safe for as long as we want.

http://blogs.reuters.com/david-cay-johnston/2012/05/04/social-security-is-not-going-broke/
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Medicare Is Not “Bankrupt”
Health Reform Has Improved Program’s Financing
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3532
 
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Howey said:
Gawd you're dense. From HR Block:

Medicare tax might be abbreviated MWT or Med. This amount is withheld so you ´ll be covered by Medicare when you reach age 65. The amount withheld from your pay is 1.45% of your gross income. Your employer pays an additional 1.45% that doesn´t come out of your paycheck.
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But this wasn't about Medicare.
This was about Obama's unfunded HC.
 
RedString said:
First off, I have credited Romney for raising the issue with the Ryan pick.

Second, I did not suggest that one should support the LP candidates, just let them be heard.

You have probably helped, in some small way, to elect many Republicans, or at least you hope to. There are thousands of Republicans who are paid to come up with policy proposals and they are paid by you and I. The LP is not staffed with many professionals and politicians that make a living off of proposing solutions. It is staffed, mostly, with volunteers who have a real job and don't get paid to write proposals that no one reads or considers.

You and I both have a right to expect that the major parties come up with policies. They are being paid handsomely to do so. You let me worry about getting something out of the LP. You have invested nothing and have no right to any return.
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But here's the thing, Republicans can write all the policies they want, they can't get them passed in the House and Senate without supermajority votes to override a Democrat filibuster. Libertarians have an even harder problem, since they don't have ANY members in Congress, that I am aware of... do they? Maybe a House member? I'm not sure, but the point is, Libertarians have even less chance to pass these sweeping and massive reforms you expect.

Ryan's plan has been criticized as not 'doing enough' to cut deficit spending, etc., but it is a responsible plan to put us on track to balancing the budget within a decade. A long-term approach to dealing with this problem once and for all, and putting us on track for fiscal responsibility in government spending. Reasonable cuts made over time, so as to not dramatically effect PEOPLE, and disrupt American LIVES or livelihood. Sensible cuts to things that don't effect every American, or hit large groups of unsuspecting Americans with burdens they simply can't overcome.
 
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