[geeks] healthcare was: nVidia 8800GT for Apple Mac Pro

[Lionel Peterson]

>From: Mike Meredith <very at zonky.org>
>Date: 2008/05/22 Thu PM 06:14:48 EDT
>To: geeks at sunhelp.org
>Subject: Re: [geeks] healthcare was: nVidia 8800GT for Apple Mac Pro

>On Thu, 22 May 2008 15:26:08 -0400, Shannon Hendrix wrote:
>> > Or even do the socialism bit properly!
>> 
>> Our taxes are already too high.
>
>Given the astonishingly high cost of the current US health care system,
>a universal socialised health care system may be cheaper in the long
>run.

How so? Without cutting back services as you expand coverage to more people, it will only get more expensive, and as you cut back services you will find it hard to get approval for a plan (any plan) to increase medical coverage.

>Going back to pure private health care would be cheaper too, but
>can you realistically see that happening ?

Sure - once the doctors organize and start refusing to take payments from insurance companies. They probably won't, but that would be the tipping point IMHO.

>Sitting on the fence is always uncomfortable :)

Depends on the fence - picket would hurt, split rail not so much...

>> services, especially since it forces me to get things I don't need.
>
>Paying for services you don't need in the form of taxation is the
>industrial equivalent of taking care of the ill members of the tribe or
>clan. 

Why do they charge one person $100 for aspirin (contrived example to make a point) in a hospital? To cover the person that came in for treatment with no ability to pay for their services, and to subsidise the treatments sold to insured patients at "discount" or contracted rates... This is our current health care system in the US in a nutshell. The person that is kept from medical attention is the one without insurance but has some means to pay for their medical services, but they stay away because the fees are astronomical in relation to the service provided...

Lionel