What a surprise: Rich insurance industry opposes health care changes

I thought other people were imagining things talking about deleted posts. But my response to you went through with only part of it deleted, the part where I said I guessed in advance that there was no point in discussing this with you.

So now when I name a successful gov't program like the CDC or the NIH you say that you think "they have had their share of missteps," though you don't actually name any. Successful apparently is defined as perfect in your mind. I guess private companies never make any missteps, just gov't agencies.

You end by saying that your demand is now for a cabinet level agency. And the standard is that they have to be perfect. You don't want to have a discussion, you just want to vent. I was right that there is no point in engaging you on this matter. You don't need me. Fume away.

You know...the nation that has evidenced Health Insurance companies' profits rising from 2+ billion $$ in 2000 to over 12+billion $$ in 2007...but, hey...don't look here: www.HealthCareforAmericaNow.org

Oversized Profits, Executive Pay

Profits at 10 of the country’s largest publicly traded health insurance companies in 2007 rose 428 percent from 2000 to 2007, from $2.4 billion to $12.9 billion, according to U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings.

In 2007 alone the chief executive officers at these companies collected combined total compensation of $118.6 million—an average of $11.9 million each. That is 468 times more than the $25,434 an average American worker made that year.

The rising premiums paid by employers and families not only generate oversized net earnings, they also fuel controversial financial maneuvers designed to pump up insurers’ stock prices, which in turn help executives reach their personal bonus targets. From 2003 through 2008 the seven largest publicly traded health insurers, which cover 116 million Americans, spent $52.4 billion buying back their own shares. Buybacks reduce the number of shares that are publicly traded, raising the value of existing shareholders’ stakes. Companies make share repurchases with excess cash on hand or with borrowed funds. Buybacks are a way of removing money from a company’s balance sheet for the benefit of investors, reflecting management’s decision not to invest in improving a company’s operations, making the health system run more efficiently or reducing customers’ premiums.

The companies prefer to hand over the money to Wall Street investors and executives whose soaring compensation packages depend on reaching earnings-per-share goals that often would not be achieved without buybacks.

full state-by-state analysis and more: http://hcfan.3cdn.net/dadd15782e627e5b75_g9m6isltl.pdf

If with the military you mean successful from an economic point of view, which is what i am referring to, than not sure how you could include the military given that almost every major weapons program has cost overruns on a large scale. There are also lots of cases of fraud there or just outright waste where they paid too much, or didn't get what they paid for and did nothing.

Did you actually respond with NASA? Remember the first space shuttle that blew up? Not sure that I would argue CDC or NIH either, they have had their share of missteps.

But if you come up with a real answer, I will wait patiently for you to come up with one.

If you want some examples of wasteful military spending, here are just a few well known ones:
-The B-2 (the flying turkey)
-V-22 Osprey
-Divads air defense system
-Bradley IFV in its earlier days
-Zumwalt class destroyer
-The recent tanker debacle (USAF)
Need I go on?

But again, note that you have yet to come up with a major cabinet level department that even you, a diehard liberal, will say is efficient. I think that pretty much proves my point.

Interface,

I don't expect the price of postage to go down, I just don't believe that government involvement automatically will inspire cost effectiveness like apop apparently does.

My own experience with the government leads me to believe the contrary.

APOP,

Try again. What is your source for your percentages?

Besides, in 50 years of mailing letters I don't ever recall the price of stamps going down.

Here's some alphabet soup of successful federal programs for you, just off the top of my head: CDC, NIH, NOAA, NTSB, NASA, USMC, USN, USAF...

http://shop.usps.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductCategoryDisplay?catalogId=10152&storeId=10001&categoryId=26402&langId=-1&parent_category_rn=11826&top_category=11826&WT.ac=26402

I can't believe some people are this clueless. You really want the government to run health care? As if the debacles known as Medicare, Medicaid and the VA are not examples enough? But wait, lets not stop there, lets look at some other government agencies that are stellar performers: The Department of Defense (yeah, no waste there), Dept. of Ag. (no waste or fraud at all in the food stamp program), the IRS or HHS (HHS is just too easy a target). So knowing how poor of a job that these agencies do of managing their (whoops, make that our) money, do you really want to literally entrust your life to them? Oh sorry, I forgot to mention Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which were quasi gov't agencies but now fully govt owned and run as poorly as ever.

And once again, why are democrats mysteriously leaving tort reform off of the table? Okay, we know why, with lawyers like Obama and Edwards in the party, you know that was off limits.

To me, insurance is not broken. If I get sick, I go to the doctor, pay my $25 copay, end of story. I had to go to the ER last year, it was not cheap, but my flex spending account had enough to cover it. Oh yeah, the Dems plans call for those to be gone too, plus they want to tax health benefits. Why on earth would you want to take something out of consumers hands that allows them to spend their money (pretax) for their health care needs? The answer, of course, is that the government sees dollar signs, they could tax that.

As to employers dropping coverage, some almost certainly will if the government plan is cheaper and they no longer get a tax break for providing it. Not all companies will, but if you run a company just barely getting by, and you can cut that cost without the employees losing coverage, you would be stupid not to look at that. Again, this is a tough concept for many liberals to grasp, but a company actually needs profits to pay their suppliers and employees. Not everyone gets a bailout from the government. Those profits being taxed is what pays for all these pie in the sky projects that liberals love to start with other people's money.

The real answers to the health care coverage are things like wellness plans, which my company has and I am using. That plan also results in reduced premiums for both my employer and myself. Better education about health issues would help. For example, the food stamp program should come with only healthy choices (no more frozen pizza, 70% lean ground beef, pop and lunchables) and mandatory nutrition counseling. Keep in mind that the biggest part of the health care issue is poor people not having coverage, not getting preventative care and then going to the ER when they have acute symptoms. The bill usually runs in the thousands or more, they can't pay, so the rest of us pay for it. Had they used preventative care, their problem could have been easily prevented and at a far lower price if caught early or prevented altogether. At some point you have to take responsibility for yourself, get educated about your health, have a healthy diet (again, that does not include frozen pizza, pop, lunchables and candy) exercise and live a smarter life.

If Yael has any evidence that government participation in anything has a track record of driving down prices, I sure would like to see it.

As someone who has worked in healthcare for 40 years I can testify that the present exorbident cost of healthcare is directly a result of the government institution of "prospective payment"
effective October 1, 1984.

It's just a case of "since your are the problem, you don't have a snowball's chance in Hell of being part of the solution".

Yael has horrible wealth envy.