The health care decision: Make your predictions

[Gilligan (Premo)]

Originally Posted by laynpipe

it is now deemed by the highest court in the land as being constitutional.

Not the whole of it without restriction; the SCOTUS clearly meant to limit the feds in any attempt to "coerce" states to increase Medicaid roles, for example.

I think it was also a "win" in the limiting of - or at least the limiting of a further expansion of - the Commerce Clause powers of the Federal government.

At the end of the day I've come to the conclusion that the only effects I will personally see from the entire mess are:

1. A fine I'll have to pay every year

2. Continued increases in what I pay for health care services.

Meh. It could be worse, I guess...

[Toxick]

Originally Posted by Larry Gude

I was wrong.

:wave:

Never in my life have I ever wanted to be wrong so badly.

[bcp (Premo)]

Originally Posted by Gilligan

Not the whole of it without restriction; the SCOTUS clearly meant to limit the feds in any attempt to "coerce" states to increase Medicaid roles, for example.

I think it was also a "win" in the limiting of - or at least the limiting of a further expansion of - the Commerce Clause powers of the Federal government.

At the end of the day I've come to the conclusion that the only effects I will personally see from the entire mess are:

1. A fine I'll have to pay every year

2. Continued increases in what I pay for health care services.

Meh. It could be worse, I guess...

as far as it goes right now, but you do understand that as time goes on and cost over runs become common, the government is going to take more and more control.
I honestly see a day where we are told who our doctor will be, we are ordered to have checkups, we are denied treatments that might save our lives.

[Toxick]

Originally Posted by Gilligan

At the end of the day I've come to the conclusion that the only effects I will personally see from the entire mess are:

You forgot one effect you'll personally see from the entire mess:


Precident has been set for the government requiring you to buy something whether you want it or not. And it's *constitutional*.


And now that precident has been set, it cannot be un-set, regardless if this disaster is repealed or not.





I'm just waiting for the day when all these ####holes who are gloating and patting themselves on the back ("it's constitutional #####es!") are forced to buy something they don't want.

Then watch who becomes the biggest and shrillest crybabies in the universe.

R.I.P.
United States of America
1776-2012
It was fun while it lasted

[bcp (Premo)]

Originally Posted by Toxick

You forgot one effect you'll personally see from the entire mess:


Precident has been set for the government requiring you to buy something whether you want it or not. And it's *constitutional*.


And now that precident has been set, it cannot be un-set, regardless if this disaster is repealed or not.





I'm just waiting for the day when all these ####holes who are gloating and patting themselves on the back ("it's constitutional #####es!") are forced to buy something they don't want.

Then watch who becomes the biggest and shrillest crybabies in the universe.

R.I.P.
United States of America
1776-2012
It was fun while it lasted

Like maybe force welfare mommas to spend their welfare dollars on an education to allow them to get off of the welfare?

Oh wait, thats not redistribution of money,, wont happen.

[Tilted (Premo)]

Originally Posted by SamSpade

That sounds a bit different from what I suggested. It seems to me they could scrap PPACA altogether and just expand the coverage of Medicaid.

Solely from the description you gave - because I am not familiar with the issue - I'd object too, especially if I was not on board with the rest of Obamacare, and it sounds like they're willing to completely axe funds they're supposed to get unless they comply. If these were people, we might call that something like blackmail - you know, you don't get your paycheck unless you see me after hours in the copy room.

I don't understand why they have to implement a trillion dollar program if the primary concern is how to insure 20 million people.

I had meant to return to this: I'm not a supporter of what they did (i.e. regarding health care reform), but I'm not clear on what you mean here vis a vis the math. What do think it should have cost if they had chosen to just provide coverage for those 20 million people and had not included any of the other aspects of the reform?

Medicare currently spends about $12,000 per year per beneficiary. Medicaid spends something like $7,000 per year per beneficiary. According to the latest CBO update, the gross cost of the PPACA's coverage provisions would be $66 Billion in 2014 and the legislation would result in 18 million fewer people being uninsured. In 2019, the gross cost would be $224 Billion and there'd be 31 million fewer uninsured people. That's around $7,000 per year per additional insured, and that's 7 years from now. The cost per beneficiary for Medicare and Medicaid will surely, without structural changes to the laws, have gone up by then. And we're talking about gross cost for the PPACA here not net cost, which would be lower.

The trillion dollars you're referring to is over a time period, not per year, and it's a gross cost not a net cost (i.e. of the whole PPACA package, including new revenue sources). About how much do you think it would cost per person, on average, to just provide a certain group of people with health care coverage (I don't think we should do that, I'm just exploring the math you were alluding to / questioning)? Considering the current per capita costs of Medicare and Medicaid, a trillion dollars over, say, 6 (future) years to cover 25 or 30 million people wouldn't seem that high. It would seem cheap, perhaps by half.