[mrlala]

>NOT on board

>had China much later in their priority list

Pick one?

>healthcare

As someone who is self employed and spends more than $20k for healthcare every year for a relatively healthy family of 4... you can just fuck right off if you don't think healthcare is a major major priority in this country.

People need to be HEALTHY in order to be HAPPY. There are so, so, so many people who can't afford to go to the doctor/dentist. They just hope for the best. Then something simple like breaking an ankle happens and it puts them into even further debt when they are already behind.

It's a viscous cycle, and sometimes it even seems like it's intended to keep down the poor.

[JoeAltmaier]

Whoa - its possible to have dental care and go to the doctor for most things, and not cost $20K per year.

So, healthcare/insurance is not really a priority for people - until it is. Until something major/fixable but very expensive occurs. Then its a priority.

So forgive people for being a little blind on the subject. Its insurance after all - you're betting the other guy your house will burn down, and hoping they win. Very strange issue, and not entirely obvious what the best solution might be.

If we could pay for everybody's unlimited medical care, maybe we'd do that. But it might not be affordable. So what kind of 'rationing' do we concede to? Because that's where the issue ends up.

[mrlala]

>Whoa - its possible to have dental care and go to the doctor for most things, and not cost $20K per year.

How do you figure that?

My health care premiums are $1350 a month for a 10k deductible and 30% co-insurance. My dental premiums are $200/mo.That is $1550/mo WITHOUT any out of pocket costs even. I'm a the premera bronze plan. This isn't even a gold plan. There are a couple plans that are _slightly_ less expensive but a bit more restrictive.

So please, how am I magically supposed to lower my costs and still be covered in case of a catastrophic event? Or serious illness like cancer? Are you suggesting I buy the $100/mo plans that cover basically NOTHING and would do NOTHING if a member of my family got cancer?

Come on. Lay it on the table. Tell me what to do?

>If we could pay for everybody's unlimited medical care, maybe we'd do that. But it might not be affordable.

Hello JoeAltmair, please meet THE REST OF THE CIVILIZED WORLD which is able to do it.

And let me give you a little analogy here. A big company like.. Microsoft, for example, is able to probably negotiate their health care premiums quite a bit because of a large base of people right? Way lower than "my cost" which is 4 people.

Now let me do something really crazy here.. bear with me.. what if we pooled over 300 million people together to have a massive base where the taxes that pay for the program are able to cover the people with little-to-no medical issues and the more extreme cases? Holy shit, what an idea.. how has no one ever thought of this before............................. are you still following me?

[JoeAltmaier]

The point I was attempting to make was, we rarely spend $20K a year on actual dental and miscellaneous medical expenses. Its the catastrophic stuff that's the real, entire reason for the insurance.

Clear?

[mrlala]

>we rarely spend $20K a year on actual dental and miscellaneous medical expenses

Yes and no.. I'm estimating $20k/4 = $5k/person for dental/medical. I mean.. with the arbitrary costs of things, that's not too insane. To say "rarely" doesn't do it justice.. pregnancy+kid? That's probably AT LEAST $15k without complications, so that boosts up the average. Young kids need a lot of visits/stuff..

Anyway, yeah I still agree that $5k/person is a bit high on what is actually spent by people if we took the whole population. Although there are so many extremes that bump up the numbers that maybe it isn't?

>Its the catastrophic stuff that's the real, entire reason for the insurance.

I agree with that.. sort of. But I think it's a misnomer to call "health insurance" just insurance.. I'm also supposed to use "health insurance" for annual visits to make sure everyone is ok. That's not insurance, that is simply keeping people healthy and a NECESSITY.

"Life insurance" is for the very unlikely situation that I will die in my 30s, and I want my family to have some security if I do.

"Health insurance" is an absolute NECESSITY because people get sick, they break bones, they have babies. We lump all this normal stuff to stay healthy in the same category as "cancer" or a massive car accident.

>Clear?

Not at all. Because you haven't given me any options. I 100% NEED "health insurance" or rather "regular health care + health insurance for the extreme" for my family. Agreed? My options are to either pay this ridiculous amount of money or have no insurance and "hope for the best". What a great country we are!

[JoeAltmaier]

We all understand that insurance was invented only a few decades ago, right? Its not been some fundamental requirement for most of humanity (still isn't) for most of human history.

I get it; the family has to be protected. But if we'd never heard of insurance, we'd all be living our lives anyway, and adopt a more fatalistic approach. And preventable tragedies would occur more often.

Sometimes I think that insurance is a scam, a con game where we all surrender our money because of scare tactics and threats of unlikely events that probably never occur.