Healthcare; The Good, The Bad and The Ugly!
Posted: Tuesday, August 18, 2009
by Diane Dutton
ESO Publications
In the course of the daily routine of life in American Society today a person will see, hear and talk about health care at least one to two times. Is this normal? No! Is this our life today? Yes! You may ask "why is this happening as a "Crisis" today?" The answer is "because the President told us the "Crisis" is today!
The big question I ask "Is this really a crisis at this moment"? My answer is no, but the President has commanded that it is, so the media, the congress and the American people are working in this "crisis" mode. The President has an agenda for Government controlled health care; the congressional majority Democrat Party has the same agenda as the President. On the other hand the majority of tax paying, voting public has a different agenda: Jobs, low taxes, lower interest rates on credit cards, lower gas prices for fueling their cars and yes, good honest competitive health insurance and health care costs.
Our country was founded on a system of checks and balances in government and our capitalistic economy where everyone has the opportunity to do well, not the right to do well or the right for the government to pay for everything. Let's stay away from that change in our society where the government (our tax dollars) pays for everyone to have health insurance and we will become a true third world country/welfare, socialist state.
Our health care system isn't perfect. It needs much improvement. We need tort reform; we need competitive group rates for all types of groups. You know the definition of insurance is the grouping of risk. In health care we need the same thought process so that small business owners can be a "group" and other groups can be created.
We need leadership that celebrates personal responsibility and personal achievement, not leadership that assumes the average American cannot think or accomplish for themselves.
So, I want better health insurance rates. My rates are terrible! Why? My rates are terrible because I was forced to retire from the world of corporate executive with drooping salary levels and a lack of control over my future. In that process of rebirth as an entrepreneur I faced 18 months of COBRA at high rates and then the world of the individual health insurance plan. There is very little flexibility to participate as a "group" for insurance rating in healthcare insurance. Your policy will be rated up and up and up for even the most minor prescriptions! Don't have an acid reflux problem, rate up; don't have a migraine problem, rate up. Now my plan is actually higher than both car payments put together with the car insurance thrown on top as icing!
Yes, I want health insurance and health care reform. I am just not willing to accept that the only "savior" for this system, which is still the best in the world, is the Federal Government control. I am convinced that smart people, given the right motivation, can create a better program for America and the American people.
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Top-level comments on this article: (2 total)I am happy for you that you actually have health insurance. That would be why you believe there is no crisis. For those who are turned down by the health insurance companies and are not allowed to purchase coverage, the crisis IS here.Please log in to respond to this comment.
You write a great article. The reforms that are truly needed are tort reform, removing interstate insurance barriers so competition between insurance companies is created nationally, ending medicaid and medicare, and using health insurance only for catastrophic claims.Free market capitalism is the only way to lower prices and increase quality on an ongoing basis. We should be able to choose our own doctor and pay that person in cash.The primary reason health costs are so high is because most doctors and hospitals take a lot of medicare patients, and therefore must accept the payments from medicare that are offered to them. These payments are for much less than the service they provide is worth. Doctors and hospitals have to make up their loss somehow. They do this by charging people who are not on medicare much more than the actual cost of the service.Eliminating medicare would stop this seesaw effect, and bring your costs down. Tort law as it exists now allows lawyers to sue insurance companies and doctors, frivolously, for huge amounts. This increases your insurance premiums because they require you to pay those jury rewards with your premiums. Out of tort self defense, doctors order many more tests than are actually needed, to cover their backside. You and the insurance companies pay for those tests. I know of a doctor, who has never been sued, who pays $100,000 a year for medical malpractice insurance. Naturally, you (as the patient) pay for that too, because all business have to pass their costs on to you, the patient.You pay the FICA tax, which is 2.9%, for medicare, AND you pay the higher medical costs that the medicare creates.Please log in to respond to this comment.
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