Where Do You Guys Stand On Drug Testing For Welfare....

[lerxstcat]

The VA hospital here in Biloxi is fucking AWESOME! Way the fuck better than the civilian hospitals or even the one at Keesler AFB.

[bane]

It's not that simple. If you want the government out of the industry, fine, but you can't make it illegal for insurance companies to deny coverage based on pre existing conditions without all of our rates going through the ceiling unless you give them a new pool of generally healthy people paying premiums to offset the additional expense. That's where the mandate idea came from. So, with that in mind, what do you suggest?

[VinnieKulick]

It's not that simple. If you want the government out of the industry, fine, but you can't make it illegal for insurance companies to deny coverage based on pre existing conditions without all of our rates going through the ceiling unless you give them a new pool of generally healthy people paying premiums to offset the additional expense.

Which is where the pool groups and interstate policies come into play.
If there were 40 million people who can't afford the insurance that is available, because the price is held higher due to various economic factors, and they were able to purchase group plans with other people in the USA, they could/should/would get it at a lower cost than what is available now.
And if there were still people who were unable to afford insurance, make block grants available on a state by state basis so that the states medicare/medicaid or other public health systems could keep up with the pace.

[bane]

You're making an assumption that those people will choose to purchase insurance. A portion of them may, but the majority probably won't, particularly the young and HEALTHY majority, which is what the industry would need in order to offset the cost. That said, I'm all for pool coverage. I think it's a great idea, particularly for the self employed small businessman, which I happen to be, but it doesn't fix the problem caused by doing away with pre existing condition clauses.

[VinnieKulick]

You're making an assumption that those people will choose to purchase insurance. A portion of them may, but the majority probably won't, particularly the young and HEALTHY majority

EXACTLY

There are people that, even if they CAN afford insurance, DO NOT FEEL THE NEED.
Which is why the 42million number is fucking bogus to begin with. It's not 42 million people who CANT get coverage. There's a huge fucking difference between CANNOT GET or CANNOT AFFORD insurance, and simply not being insured.

Requiring people to purchase goods and services that they feel they do not need, so that other's can get something that THEY want doesn't make sense.

That said, I'm all for pool coverage. I think it's a great idea, particularly for the self employed small businessman, which I happen to be, but it doesn't fix the problem caused by doing away with pre existing condition clauses.

Pool coverage is a great idea. They could add some type of government incentive for purchasing and maintaining it (a tax deduction) it would make good sense. More people buying, means prices would be offset.

[bane]

You're arguing in circles. You said you think the government should make pre existing condition clauses illegal and offered a solution to fund it. When I offered an explanation for why your solution won't work, you came back with the reason we don't need it in the first place? Make up up your mind already.

[VinnieKulick]

I wasn't arguing in circles.

First, the number of people who are UNABLE to get insurance is unknown, since those who choose NOT to get insurance is not available.

Second, if you eliminate the prior conditions exclusion, it doesn't mean that everybody's prices will rise.

Third, if there were pools available, and cross state line access, the number of people without insurance would drop drasticly.

Which is more? People who can't afford insurance, or people with pre existing conditions?

They can both be fixed, or one of the two could be fixed. But either way, the government getting into the health insurance industry isn't the answer in any way, shape or form.

[VinnieKulick]

a

[VinnieKulick]

That's not true. You can get an accurate estimate on the number who choose to go uninsured using the same statistical methods insurance companies use to assess risk and determine how much to charge for a policy.

So, how many people are uninsured because they WANT to be, and how many are uninsured because the insurance companies won't cover them?

It most likely does mean that policies will rise across the board. Insurance companies refuse to cover people with pre-existing conditions because they don't think the policies sold to these people will be profitable. If they are forced to sell unprofitable policies, they are going to have to make up the revenue somewhere else. Either by selling overpriced insurance policies to people who are not likely to get sick (the mandate), raising rates, or receiving a subsidy from the govt.

The more policies they sell, the more they make, right? How many people actually use all of their benefits and become a net loss for the insurance industry? The price rise would be negligible.

That assumes that those measures would drastically reduce the cost of an insurance policy and that's a big assumption since the profit margin for health insurance is already very low. Increased competition might cause them to become more aggressive in cost cutting measures such as dropping people when they are sick.

Wait a minute. Are you actually trying to make an argument, using the theory that health insurance companies make a very low profit?
Why do we have group healthcare? Because it's cheaper than buying singular policies, right? So, open up the ability to create large pools, and it would provide affordable health insurance for more people.

So you're back to "big government is bad?" You've been wanting big government throughout this thread, you're just too dumb to realize it. The govt. is already into the health insurance industry.

[/quote]

Passing a law isn't advocating BIG GOVERNMENT.
Big government is the government growing, adding more federal jobs, to take over a portion of the private sector job market and spending trillions of dollars to do so.

And, you really want to point to Medicare as a model for what we should be doing? It's the most broken system in America.