I predict none of that will change and the medical care situation will get worse while at the same time the administration continues to claim victory. Then a group of terminally ill patents who have had their treatments cut off will gather just outside the Whitehouse perimeter and commit suicide in protest. That event will mark the point where the bullshit started to dry up and real serious reforms were considered.
But only for about a week. Then some celebrity will get pregnant and everyone will forget.
"I'm saddened to see that students' well-being has to be held in a cost-benefit analysis,"
Advanced medical care is a very expensive and very limited resource. Trying to give that sort of care to everyone would result in almost no one getting it in time to make a difference and bills that accumulate to rival our GDP.
You can't legislate a limited resource into an unlimited resource. You can't legislate away disease and death. All you end up doing is making sure everyone get a little more disease and death by messing things up.
There will come a day when healthcare is no longer a problem because it will no longer be a limited resource. That day is far away, and we can't even start to get there until the FDA is shut down.
Edited By TPRJones on 1359669943
"ATTENTION: Customers browsing porn must hold magazines with both hands at all times!"
You can't legislate a limited resource into an unlimited resource.
At least half the population won't figure that out until they all get some chronic, debilitating (but not fatal) disease that requires some insane, expensive-ass treatment either:
1. made from a very finite amount of raw material. We're talking like some hitherto undiscovered, endangered species that secretes some weird-ass chemical we can't reproduce or other natural phenomenon that happens almost never that produces the required resources OR
2. done by a process that is ridiculously expensive for people not infected. Maybe the cure lives at the top of Mons Olympus on Mars and it has to be brought back to Earth on a regular basis or it just takes 10,000 hours of labour to make a single dose.
In the first case, there will be no recourse other than scientific research and hope. In the second, people's survival will be decided by the ultimate cost-benefit analysis, natural selection. Species bottleneck, only those with the optimal traits (those that allow them to get a piece of the cure) live on.
I suppose you could alternatively up the cancer rates (or something similar) by 1000% or more and watch as sheer volume suffocates a bloated, bad idea of a system.
Any of those three would force a decision. Until then, the budget is a magic bag of money with no bottom explained away by the miracle of economics. I say "miracle" because I'd wager the majority of the American populous couldn't pass Econ 101 and has little to no financial experience except for the one time they saw either Wall$treet movie.
Edited By Malcolm on 1359673210
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
That's just it, though, it doesn't matter how much money is in the magic bag. There are only so many doctors with so much time. There are only so many MRI machines, so many chemo treatments, so many nurses, so many etc etc to go around. And there are never anywhere close to enough.
Money can help with some of that, but not all of it. Even if you had the federal government pay every doctor a salary of $10mil a year in order to get more doctors, it would take a long time to get enough. And probably not even then, as few people have what it takes to be a good doctor; all you'd really do is make far more bad doctors.
"ATTENTION: Customers browsing porn must hold magazines with both hands at all times!"
Even if you had the federal government pay every doctor a salary of $10mil a year in order to get more doctors, it would take a long time to get enough. And probably not even then, as few people have what it takes to be a good doctor; all you'd really do is make far more bad doctors.
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
Interesting choice in their example there, that $120,000 family. Especially when you consider the average household income in the US is closer to $50,054.
That's average. So there are a lot of families making well under that mark. Families that will have to spend every dime if they want to pay for the required bronze plan, and not eat any food, or wear clothes, or pay rent, etc. They'll be made homeless and starving, but at least they'll have insurance.
"ATTENTION: Customers browsing porn must hold magazines with both hands at all times!"
Using the conditions laid out in the regulations, the IRS calculates that a family earning $120,000 per year that did not buy insurance would need to pay a "penalty" (a word the IRS still uses despite the Supreme Court ruling that it is in fact a "tax") of $2,400 in 2016.
Heh.
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
I'm keeping my eyes open for more info, because I can't see how it makes any type of sense for anyone to pay for insurance any more, when you can just get it when you need it, since you can't be denied for preexisting conditions.
Makes it difficult to get insurance quickly when you break your leg, I guess, but.... it seems like it will be a lot cheaper to pay the penalty tax than to pay for insurance, even after you pay $50 for each small doctor office visit, like I do now.
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
Reading about this on some other page, talking about how Obama's original estimate was going to be a cost of $2,065, they say $20k for the cheapo plan is an order of magnitude off.
One commenter said, "Orders of magnitude are racist."
Another said, " I don't understand the math, just how many underage Dominican hookers is that?"
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
Bronze will be the lowest tier health-insurance plan available under Obamacare--after Silver, Gold, and Platinum. Under the law, the penalty for not buying health insurance is supposed to be capped at either the annual average Bronze premium, 2.5 percent of taxable income, or $2,085.00 per family in 2016.
So, which is it? I assume the smallest of those three totals?
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
The more I read it, I can't even figure out if that sentence is talking about three things, two, or one.
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
CBO said that this year's tax cuts have changed the incentives for businesses and made it less attractive to pay for insurance, meaning fewer will decide to do so. Instead, they'll choose to pay a penalty to the government, totaling $13 billion in higher fees over the next decade.
So it's all about another fucking tax. The article also calls the Congressional Budget Office "non-partisan," which is just hilarious.
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
HeroBuilders has also created the Anthony Weiner doll, one of the “Rent Is Too Damn High” candidate in New York, the Balloon Boy’s dad and the Bernie Madoff action figure.
Yeah, they're not opportunistic douchebags. Surprised they didn't do one for David Petraeus. In addition, why would a joint called HeroBuilders make a fucking Bernie Madoff action figure? I mean, I guess he's their hero because he's ripping people off like they only wish they could, but still, wtf?
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
