Why UUU putting down people with less costly plans?....some people can not afford a larger plan....yours is probaly paid for by the company U work for....people bought plans that they could afford on their own

I know people who have had to sell their homes and rent apartments because of many reasons, should we create an "EFFECTIVE EFFICIENT government program" for each of those as well because "it should never, ever happen"??

you just provided the rationale for every massive bureaucratic transfer system that we have, please name one that is EFFECTIVE and EFFICIENT.......one that did not start from sentiment like the one you expressed only to grow exponentially beyond it's promised purpose and cost....one that is not unsustainable and headed for disaster as you've pointed out countless times....:)

Would it have been possible for those people (how many?--I don't know any--is this a rampant problem?)--would it have been possible for them to refinance their home for a loan to pay off their medical bills? And if, after paying the medical bills they couldn't afford to rent "nice" rather than "crappy" apartments, were they already in financial difficulty? If not, couldn't the money they paid for an apartment been used to pay notes on the refinanced house? Lots of questions to be answered here before government mandates that everyone else should pay for their medical bills.

Should old folks be able to keep or pass on all of their assets to family (homes, cars, bank accounts, etc.) and still have the "government" pay for their expensive care in nursing homes?

Should people who lose a job have the "government" subsidize their house notes so they can stay their rather than move to crappy apartments.

There are so many situations which affect millions of people from which they have to extricate themselves that could easily be "fixed" by the "government" paying for the fix.

Sorry Scott--posted this while you were posting yours.

All one has to do to see how poorly government runs it health program we just have to look at how the VA treats its wounded soldiers....it is socialist medicine

In my opinion, which you disagree with...I'd rather have some kind of public program that levels the playing field to lessen the financial impacts of catastrophic health costs which (1) those afflicted have zero control over, and which (2) could happen to any of us at any time. I'd rather have it at the local level than in DC.

"I know people who have had to sell their homes and rent apartments because of many reasons"

Me too. I'm not talking about allowing people to avoid responsibility for bad decisions. I'm talking about helping those who did absolutely nothing to contribute to their predicament. If someone could devise a well run program to achieve that goal, I'd support it. Maybe you wouldn't.

It seems that government programs are most effective in creating a greater need for their service than existed before the programs started. That appears to be the nature of providing "help". The appearance is that they are "working" because more seek the help. So the "help" expands and the cost gets larger not only because of larger numbers to be "helped" but because the large pool of govt. money also raises the cost of the "help".

In reality, people become less "efficient" in solving their own problems because it is easier to let government do it.

It is such an obvious circle of events. But the allure of easier living is too great to resist. That it is heading toward a collapse of a system of individual responsibility to one of government dependence appears not to be a problem. It can all be replaced with an effectively efficient system of total government control. That such systems have not worked due to that mysterious desire in human nature to be free of them is not a problem. Our way will be better.

"And if, after paying the medical bills they couldn't afford to rent "nice" rather than "crappy" apartments, were they already in financial difficulty?"

No. The family I know, had medical bills that ran in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Not mane people can write a check for that amount and not see a big downward shift in their standard of living, and it doesn't necessarily mean that they were in "financial difficulty" to begin with. They weren't uber-rich, but they were not in financial difficulty by my standards.

I'm not naïve enough to believe that the feds could pull it off without waste and abuse. Nor am I so cynical and callous that I'm willing to say "tough cookies" to people who are so afflicted.

Many of those reasons Scott was talking about also involve situations where the individual has, as you put it, "zero control over". Two that I mentioned above, growing old and in need of 24/7 care and the loss of job and income. Their is no such thing as a well run "government" program to solve them without changing the nature of our society. If you think a "safe" government manipulated society is better than one of individual choice fraught with messy problems, than we differ in more than minor preferences.

Now you're really losing me. We need a government program to pay for hundreds of thousands of dollars? If there were such a program, don't you think there would be a lot more cases of such need as exist now? And if the government was willing to pay for them all, wouldn't that even raise the cost of the medicine even more? It sounds like the prescription for more of the same escalating costs we are experiencing now--on steroids.

Wouldn't it be more effective, and more economically reasonable for the rest of society, if the individual negotiated those prices rather than the government either just paying them or instead controlled them.

If your friends could not afford to pay, the medical providers could not collect. Either negotiation or default would occur. Third party has distorted this into a spiral of higher costs, government intervention, and unsustainable debts.

that statement presumes that the only option for "those so afflicted" is assistance from some benevolent government entity or death in the streets, which I think would fit quite nicely into an Obama campaign speech

"We need a government program to pay for hundreds of thousands of dollars?"

Our consciences should demand that we need something to lessen the burden tee people face. In the absence of private programs providing the safety net, the gubmint could do it.

"If there were such a program, don't you think there would be a lot more cases of such need as exist now?"

Yes. Detbuch, you and Scott are sharp enough to play devil's advocate, where you could articulate dozens of potential pitfalls and abuses. In the meantime, innocent decent people are suffering for things they could not possibly control. If we can split an atom, perhaps we can figure out a way to address this too.

"If your friends could not afford to pay, the medical providers could not collect."

These are dear friends. They could afford to pay most of it, and it cost them everything they had. They had a child born with leukemia and bad kidneys, and they were absolutely wiped out by the bills. Household income was about $125k, and they had decent insurance.

They had decent insurance, they got help from family and friends, our town had fundraisers, they relied on charities like Ronald McDonald House. And still, they got wiped out. Every cent of home equity, gone. Every cent they had saved since they started working, gone. Credit cards maxed out. Every cent was for medical expenses.

I don't claim to be able to answer any of the "well, what about THIS" gotcha arrows you can sling my way. But my claim is that we can do a little better in this area.

so if your friends had "decent insurance" and still got wiped, what would the government do or how would the government prevent that?....would decent insurance purchased through government exchanges rather than decent insurance purchased through the private market or provided by an employer have been any different?

you are going through all sorts of emotional gymnastics without any solid point or explaining exactly how this should work.... and ignoring your own repeated mantra....I feel like I'm listening to Obama or Hillary during their primary...:uhuh: "we should do something....anything...our consciences demand it...innocent decent people are suffering for things they could not possibly control".....GOOD GRIEF...WHAT????? WOULD....YOU....DOOOO


wait...I think I've got this....from what I can discern from what you've written....you'd like to create a efficient and effective benevolent government program run from a benevolent government office that will be efficient and effective...and filled with benevolent government officials and underlings who will likewise be efficient and effective and what?...non-union?...and whose job it will be to decide who gets assistance from their benevolent budgets despite your railing against and pointing out the problems with all of this benevolence for quite some time....so that things like what happened to your friend will never happen to anyone again because that is the only way to prevent such things from happening....

sadly...the only thing that skirts reality in all of that is the story about your friend........

Scott, the difference between me and them, as that I wouldn't mandate that we all pay for the voluntary, sometime-unethical choices that we make. I'm not saying you pay for my drug needles.

I'm not saying I have a vision for how this would work. I am saying that we can do better, in my opinion. If you need some details, I'd say that we all pay some amount into a pool, that could be tapped into to ease the burden of catastrophic and uncontrollable medical expenses.

I'm glad you weren't in the Army Chief Of Staff in 1938. You want to increase the military tenfold? Impossible. Stop showing news reels of European Jews being gassed, I'm not persuadable by such 'emotional gymnastics'. How can we fight on 2 fronts? Why should we have to sacrifice to save Europe and China from enslavement?

Obamacare, clearly, is about much more than helping our neighbors. It's a vehicle to fund a whole liberal wishlist like contraceptives, and to increase the scope of the feds - that's the goal. I'm talking about things, I think, that are more vital to the human condition.

That something is hard, or will be flawed, doesn't necessarily mean it's not worth doing.

well...looks like I nailed that...except that the benevolent government official will efficiently and effectively decide what are ethical and unethical choices :uhuh:

"glad you weren't in charge when Hitler was killing Jews"...that's good one Jim...real original :)

Jim, I understand how you must feel, especially being these people are friends of yours and a child is involved. I don't think there are any answers at this time to pay for such an event that no one could predict. Any Govt. program would be a losing proposition with waste fraud and the usual incompetency.

The only thing I could think of would be some kind of a catastrophic insurance policy, similar to an Umbrella Policy which you can add to a Home Owners Policy,added to a medical insurance policy to cover those kind of medical issues. The cost, I am sure would be very expensive, but the cost of medicine, which will never go down, and is now a fact of life. As our technology's progress costs will continue to rise and everyone wants the best. The days of Doc Adams getting paid with vegetables are long gone, although I do know of some Docs who do NC work for those who can't pay, but that's not the big costs of high tech and hospital costs.
Competition is the only way to keep things some what in check, and the Govt. is unwilling to do what they could do to reduce costs by allowing Interstate Competition and Tort Reform.
I feel for this family as they are truly between a rock and a hard place.

no one can argue that the circumstances for this family are tragic...it's a little surprising to see Jim however, who spends significant time railing about the inefficiencies and looming financial disaster created by various government programs and the inherent dynamics that occur when government involves itself in many things, would seek to have government attempt to solve this issue...but more and more we seem to think that government should and could provide the solutions to many things, with the right people in charge of course....government seems quite content to supplant private charity with it's own form of compassion

The fact that it wasn't original, doesn't mean that it wasn't on point. Your argument against my thought, was that it would be difficult and imperfect. Some causes are noble enough that you take them head-on, even though they will be difficult and imperfect. Sometimes when you have the ability to do something, then you also have the responsibility to do it. That was Bush's argument wen he launched his AIDS treatment plan in Africa. It was difficult, and it was imperfect, and probably has some waste. But Stanford University estimates that it saved more than one million lives. If I have to work an extra month or two before I retire, to pay for my share of the cost of saving a million lives, that's something I'll gladly take.

Scott, you and Detbuch pointed out a long lit of absolutely valid concerns about why such a thing would likely be inefficient, wasteful, possibly ineffective, and maybe unconstitutional. I concede all of that.

I did try to answer most of your points. Maybe you can answer one of mine. Just one. My friends will likely never be able to purchase a home, and likely never be able to retire. What would YOU say to him when he's 75 years old, and working at McDonalds or as a greeter at WalMart, because his daughter will still need expensive care? "Too bad?" "That's the way life goes?" "That's the way the cookie crumbles"?

I think we can do better. That's just my $0.02.

I don't pretend to have any kind of a solution. But I don't believe that it's beyond the abilities for us to improve the current situation. One of the my favorite things about this country, is that we are at our best when things are at their worst.

[QUOTE=scottw;1020128it's a little surprising to see Jim however, who spends significant time railing about the inefficiencies and looming financial disaster created by various government programs and the inherent dynamics that occur when government involves itself in many things, would seek to have government attempt to solve this issue...[/QUOTE]

Scott, I agree with you on the vast majority of the issues, an dI respect the way you state your opinions, including the way you are stating your opinions here. You make a very, very compelling case, and I admit I don't have an effective response to many of your arguments.

I do rail against the hole we are in with entitlements, as it was avoidable...I don't want to go broke myself, so that we can reward blocks of citizens with financial perks that are insanely expensive.

My assumption is that we could, collectively, make a big dent in reducing stress of people like my friends, without making extreme sacrifices. Hell, if the feds could wisen up and gut (or eliminate) wasteful boondoggles like the Dept of education, dept of energy, etc...that alone might provide the funds. It'd be a better allocation of those dollars, that's for sure...

Good jousting, though.

:)

I see people who are at that age working in the places that you speak of, one that comes right to mind is working at the cash register at the CVS down the street...he was an owner of a furniture store here for most of my life...I don't know the circumstances but he has to work at that age for whatever reason, he may need a government program to cure that? I fully expect to still be working at that age, maybe I need a government program....as unfortunate as your friend's circumstance is...people get kicked in the nuts by life all of the time...he could also be a millionaire by the time he's 75 with the right circumstances... you seem to be assuming the worst for him...there are plenty of examples of people that turn these things into great successes... but it's less likely he'll succeed in this economy being strangled by all of the debt that we owe due to the other misguided programs that were sold as intended to prevent people from having to deal with the unfortunate things that happen in life and our steady move to a government assisted society rather than an entrepreneurial free market capitalistic model ever since we reached "peak capitalism" back during the recovery summer

I don't know if "we" can do a little better. I'm sure philanthropic donors could. Voluntary free hospitals could. Pro-bono services by other hospitals in rare cases. Various children's charities, even ones for specific diseases such as leukemia and cancer. There is something called Catastrophic Illness in Children Relief Program that's sponsored by individual states. Connecticut had such a House Bill 5498 proposed in 2008. I don't know if it was passed. Massachusetts and New Jersey have versions of it. Even other local and state government assistance and regulations where such is closer to the people to approve at ballot boxes. But if you let the federal gvt. stick its nose in the door, it will soon walk in entirely and add your problems to its unsustainable budget as well as regulating it in ways that you may not like, and for which you will have no control. And that will be precedence to expand to other peoples various personal catastrophes. Not just the rare ones in which we could do a little better.

it was fascinating to watch him roll through just about every classic modern liberal reasoning/argument and mode of argument for a federal government program to cure an ill or correct a societal wrong....:uhuh: thought he was being possessed by Spence after a visit to the witchdoctor or something

No. I wouldn't say that we need a government program for every conceivable reason that someone may be struggling.

Let me try to articulate my feeling this way...I don't think we need government programs to guarantee equality of outcome. But I think it might be worthwhile to have safety nets that guarantee more equality of opportunity.

For example, I had friends at UCONN whose parents worked hard to pay tuition, and my friends didn't work hard and graduated with worthless degrees in things like communications. Those friends are struggling a bit, and I have no problem whatsoever with the fact they are struggling. They had the opportunity, they made bad choices, so it's just and fair that they face the consequences.

I can't bring myself to feel the same way about people who struggle with medical expenses. If my friends (with the sick daughter) were struggling because they made bad business decisions, or because they flushed their money away on expensive cars, that's one thing. But their struggles are from causes that they had zero control over.

In a perfect world, we'd all have the same oppotunities to be successful. I have no issue with people who make stupid choices, having to live with the consequences of their choices. However, I don't think that's equivalent to someone struggling because they, or someone in their family, was born sick. Those are distinguishable scenarios.

My Catholicism trumps my political conservatism...

you should know by now that when government takes the reigns they tend to blur those "distinguishable differences" so as to include as many in their "charity' as possible...there are plenty of current examples

I'm not about to argue with that irrefutably correct statement. I wouldn't trust this current federal government with much.

But I do disagree with your statement that I am looking to guarantee equality of outcomes. If people make stupid or irresponsible decisions, they can deal with the consequences of that. I can't say that any more clearly, and that should convey that I am not looking to make outcomes equal.

But it would be worthwhile, I think, to do what we can to remove this opportunity-limiting event.

Did your friend's daughter survive and is she better? Are your friends recovering from the economic disaster? Are they gradually doing better. I hope all of that is the case. If it is, then they seized the opportunity they were given to overcome a terrific obstacle, and they should be a lot stronger for it.

If not, is the answer then to "more" equalize financial outcomes for everyone by eliminating disasters for some?

I think if you put your feelings aside for a moment and look at what you've written you'll realize that you are arguing myopically for more of what you constantly rail against simply because you have an experience or a tragedy close to you that you feel needs being corrected....this is how all of these "safety nets" get set up, some politician finds a sad story, demands that this "never, ever happen to anyone again", proposes a government managed solution, claims anyone that disagrees is coldhearted and draconian and..... poof...we have a new government program sold to cure some societal ill...funded by tax dollars from a "general fund" that is never fully funded.... forever ...but we know how it always ends up....Jim...if you start a fund to help your friends today, I'll be the first to contribute without even knowing them....or...I could send the same money to some government agency and let it trickle through the machinations of the bureaucracy where they might end up with a tiny percentage of the original "contribution" which means many others must be made to "contribute"...of course, if you set up your "safety net to guarantee more equality of [U]opportunity"...you authorize the government to take and spend from others as/when it sees fit and where it sees need for equality of opportunity...if it's a local institution, you may have some measure of control but if it's the federal government, I doubt you'll like how it picks and chooses eventually and there is nothing that you can do once that ball gets rolling....this is a microcosm of what's wrong with the way that government inherently operates, a symptom of how we've been conditioned to "feel" that wrongs should be righted and not only don't you seem to see it, you are participating in it and feeding the beast, :)