Soylent Green Is People said:
Math is hard NSR. I'm going to need Soylent Yellow to give me an idea what those graphs are saying. I trust your word on it though.
Couple of logs on the fire:
1) Anyone gone on to see what they get in their plan? Per Covered California, for an extra $300 per month from what I could get on my own, my family gets a lower coverage amount, no vision, no dental. Yay Gubmint!
2) I know everyone loves to say "I can get affordable monthly payments". Someone please load up an Admiral Akbar jpg please because "ITS A TRAP". Doesn't matter how low the payment is. If all you get is crappy deductibles and limited service choices, that low payment isn't going to look like the bargain people believe it is.
3) "Healthcare is a right" In some ways it is. Access to healthcare is a reasonable human right. Socializing the medical bills for a 22 year old dumbass who decided to skateboard without a helmet, later cracking their skull open isn't. The question has to come at some point in time about personal responsibility for situations they find themselves in. Since we're now a society of zero consequence, sadly that day isn't ever going to arrive.
4) It's charming to hear supporters chime in "well, Europe has socialized medicine..." Europe also has twice the unemployment rate of the U.S.. Paris has regular race riots, as did Sweden recently. Prostitution is the only expanding industry in Greece today because of their government collapse. Ireland is a virtual slave state. Young Estonians are depopulating the State because there is zero opportunity, and 54% of Spain's budget is going towards Pensions and Social Programs. The Eurozone is collapsing, but at least you can get your kidney stones removed for free, providing you can get an appointment within 2 months.
5) Why are Unions and Congress exempt if the ACA is the greatest thing since sliced bread?
6) Find for me a government social program that has shrunk in size since inception? "But Head Start funds are being cut....!" No, the rate of growth is being cut, not the baseline.
The ACA should have been strangled in its crib, then started over with a non-political beginning. Wait..I'm talking about Congress and the President. Nevermind.
My .02c.
1) You can pick a number of coverage levels. Of course deductibles and out of pockets matter but for many people, they wouldn't even qualify for plans because of certain conditions or age. If you are a young healthy person, you will have a higher premium. If you are older and have some conditions, you will have a lower premium. I have seen examples of both.
2) It is not a matter of "bargain" Most people won't be affected because they have employer-based healthcare. The people affect are those who don't have insurance now because their employer don't offer it, don't have jobs, or choose not to get it. Most of the people who don't have insurance would get it if it was affordable. There is an estimate 84 million people in the US who are either uninsured or under-insured.
3) Of course personal responsibility is important but the fact of the matter is that those people exist whether you have ACA or not. People who take stupid risks, eat too much, have bad lifestyle choices exists now...the question is what to do about them. There are a couple of choices: 1) Treat them or 2) let them die. If you choose to treat them, you then need to choose whether you want to try and head them off early or in the ER.
It's no different with Social Security. If you don't have social security, what are you going to do with all those seniors who don't have a job in their 60s and cannot support themselves? What about all those people who invested in 401K and lost most of their investments? What about people who lost everything during the housing bubble? You may say, tough but those people are still around.
4) ?You know who also has socialized healthcare? Germany, Japan, Canada, Scandavian countries, Switzerland, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore...and all these other countries
http://www.theatlantic.com/internat...-health-care-americas-still-not-on-it/259153/
Are all those nations also collapsing?
you don't have to wait 2 months for an appointment...Taiwan for example has a fantastic healthcare program...you can go to whatever doctor/hospital you want.
Of course, in this country, you don't make appointment if you don't have health insurance. You just wait until your condition is unbearable and then you wait in the ER for 12 hours and get treated in the most expensive way possible.
The US spends the most money on healthcare per capita than other developed countries and have worse results.
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/health/131001/global-health-care-systems-obamacare
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown...how-the-us-compares-with-other-countries.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...ow-americas-health-care-prices-are-ludicrous/
5) Certain Unions are exempt but most aren't. Congress is not "exempt," they have an employer based health care...you know they work for the federal government.
There has also been no discussion about the substantial ancillary benefits of having a healthier population and a system in which you don't depend on your employer for health benefits.