How do we fix our healthcare system in America?

House Repair Talk

Help Support House Repair Talk:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
C

Chris

Guest
Just curious on your thoughts of how we can fix our healthcare system and make it more affordable for the masses?


Back in January my health insurance premium went up to almost $1700 a month for my family and I. I am 37, my wife is 29 and I have a 4 and 2 year old, thats $20,400 a year before deductibles and copay's. We have a 6500 Deductible. So no matter what happens to any of us we are out 27k before they pay anything. That is a lot of money. We decided that we would let our insurance lapse and pay cash for any doctor visits like we used to. It is a gamble if anything major happens but right now we can't afford the extra.

Personally I was better off before the ACA came around. I know that in order to give more people free or very low cost health care that others that pay more into the system like myself will have to help with this burden but I think it has been getting out of hand. At what point is it stealing from the working class to give to others? Four years ago a family plan cost me about 400 bucks a month and any extra kid was free and I had low copays, now it is more than four times that amount.

People say that we need to go on a system like Canada or the EU where we just get taxed more but healthcare is given to you but if you look at our government they haven't been able to run a succesful program yet so I am worried it would just be another failure.


Our problem is first the insurance companies are a business and businesses are in business to make profit. Second is our Doctors and hospitals are greedy and charge outrageous costs for anything they do or touch. Then you have our government which is also greedy and in business to make a profit and charge several times over for anything they do because of all the people that need to get paid off before the program even see's any tax money. You add them all together and you have the ACA. You force a private insurance company to cover any and all people and they will but they aren't gonna do it cheap and they also are taking advantage of this same situation.

Personally I think our only hope now that we have gone as far as we have and we can not just cancel policies of all these people that just got their free insurance that we need to open the borders and let people buy insurance from any other state. Make as much competition as possible and that will drive down prices. It's either that or let the government fully run it but I don't see that going good.

What are your thoughts? All I want is my affordable health coverage back.
 
Quit your job, get free healthcare, get free Obama phones, get free Government subsidized internet, file for low income assistance for your utilities, get yourself a free loaded credit card, get free milk, cheese and staples from the various WIC programs, and apply for government (section 8) subsidized housing. Oh yeah, don't forget to apply for welfare, which for 4 of you will be about $1800 per month. Have mama pop out a kid every year, and watch your earnings grow exponentially. If you really want to outsmart California politics, have you and your wife get addicted to drugs. Give the two kids to your dad, and the government will pay your dad $2800 a month per child, and ask him to give you half that money back.
 
Sounds like you have it all planned out. Problem is I don't want to keep popping out kids. Everything else sounds great
 
Quit your job, get free healthcare, get free Obama phones, get free Government subsidized internet, file for low income assistance for your utilities, get yourself a free loaded credit card, get free milk, cheese and staples from the various WIC programs, and apply for government (section 8) subsidized housing. Oh yeah, don't forget to apply for welfare, which for 4 of you will be about $1800 per month. Have mama pop out a kid every year, and watch your earnings grow exponentially. If you really want to outsmart California politics, have you and your wife get addicted to drugs. Give the two kids to your dad, and the government will pay your dad $2800 a month per child, and ask him to give you half that money back.
C'mon grow up for just a little while. Chris asks a serious question, and all you have is the same snappy answer that leads to the same "us & them circus" that always comes next.
It's a real problem. It's not just the projects population that gets benefitted from the ACA. I saved a little bit under this program. And it is savings lives of real people who otherwise would just circle the drain. Middle class folks with existing conditions. Retirees, independent contractors in many fields, who have to live from paycheck to paycheck.
 
Ain't going to happen, you don't have enough people to push for what needs to be done.
Do you think you have politicians that could take on insurance companies, doctors, drug companies, hospitals, med lab companies, ex-ray companies and unions all at the same time.

Countries that have a system do negotiate for drug prices, own the hospitals or most of them, they set the price for visits to the doctor, you can't get to a specialist with out a Dr. saying you need to.

Your system will bounce around a few times before one state really takes it up and does it properly then others may follow.

Our basic system does not pay for drugs, dental and few other things, we can buy that privately. But nobody pays the prices you are quoting
 
When I pay cash like I have for many years I can go straight to a specialist. Also when I pay cash my bills are what they are supposed to be. I had some major back problems a dew years ago and it was cheaper to go cash than pay the co-pays on my insurance. I got my mri for 400 cash when my copay for one was 1000. I just couldn't tell them I had insurance or they would have had to run it that way. My specialist was 65 a visit cash while copay for my general doc was 40.

I wish we could just get insurance to cover major stuff and pay cash for doctors and whatnot. Nobody should have to pay 20k plus just to see a doctor a couple times a year.
 
I know that it would be quite an undertaking, but I think that because medical treatment is absolutely essential, they need to have more regulation in terms of the pricing. There were two hospitals in the same state just two miles away from one another. The doctors performed the exact same type of treatment with the exact same type of equipment but one hospital charged literally $100,000 more for that treatment.

I think that medical facilities should have what are essentially menus that tell people how much things cost and that people should be able to know ahead of time how much things would cost them. I also think that the government (as overstretched as it is) should do something about price gouging. Now, obviously, prices aren't going to be the same in every state or even city because of the local economies-- but when hospitals are arbitrarily charging obscene amounts for things, they need to be stopped.

I don't think an uninsured person should be charged more for something than an insurance company would pay for that treatment. I was charged literally 5x what my mother was charged for the same treatment at the same hospital.

And beyond that, they should find out how much things cost to make sure that the hospitals aren't gouging the insurance companies either.

They need to stop insurance companies from cutting people's benefits when they reach 65 (but not cutting the premiums) and forcing them to get supplementary insurance (this is what happened to my mother).

I understand that some people are too impoverished to pay even reasonable prices for things but I don't think it is fair the way they scaled the cost of insurance vs income. I can see making lower payments for people who are below the poverty line or barely making ends meet-- but scaling it up and punishing people who make more money isn't helping. It ends up hurting the middle class the most.

I think they should also do what the commissioner of insurance wanted to do-- which was to consider the $ the insurance companies have in reserve in banks as part of their assets when assessing whether or not those companies can be approved for raising their premiums. They currently don't allow them to consider that money and there are companies with billions in reserve that claim they need to raise rates.

The Medicare system has some pretty stupid things as well-- such as requiring patients to go to hospitals for treatment and testing instead of private doctors when the hospitals actually cost more.

Other than those things, I don't think there is a perfect solution and I don't know what other changes need to be made.

I don't know if the government would actually attempt it-- right now most of the clowns in power don't seem to care about the general masses. They have their special pensions and medical plans that take care of them so why should they give a damn about other people? Unless it actually affected them in some way, they are not likely to do anything.

But that doesn't mean we, as a society, shouldn't try to improve things.

Editing to add: I don't think insurance companies should be allowed to reject people for previously existing conditions or refuse to pay for things related to those conditions. And they should not have lifetime or annual payouts.

I'm still bitter that I had to drop my insurance because the premiums tripled, deductible doubled, and the lifetime payout dropped below what I had already paid the insurance-- and I only used that insurance ONCE in the entire time I had it-- and I had that insurance for over 5 years. Of course, as soon as I dropped it I got sick and had to go to the hospital.
 
Last edited:
You hit the nail on the head with a few points
one, if you think single pay is the way to go, take a look at the VA and how the vets care is managed
that is big gov, in full action.
the gov. needs to stay out of the health care business, it needs to be private tised
to help the indigent pay for there health and give them quality care.
the monies that are to be refunded from taxes at the end of the year, should go into a health care account for that person

The only way i see for insurance to be affordable [ Thank you Chris, could not say it any better my self]

'''Personally I think our only hope now that we have gone as far as we have and we can not just cancel policies of all these people that just got their free insurance that we need to open the borders and let people buy insurance from any other state. Make as much competition as possible and that will drive down prices. It's either that or let the government fully run it but I don't see that going good.'''
 
Bud, my response was not just a snappy, political answer. In California, everything I wrote still occurs on a daily basis. I know several people who have just thrown in the towel and chose the method I described. The problem for us in California is the system is completely broken. THIS is why Chris pays the amount of money he does. We can not change the insurance issue until we change the entire system. What I don't understand is the fact that I have Blue Shield HMO which I pay ~$550 a month for just myself, but the office visit co-pays are $15, and my meds usually cost about $4 a month.

Chris, we have a very close friend who has helped numerous friends with their medical coverage, and is licensed from ACA to many HMO's and most PPO's. Have you shopped around to get price comparisons? Let me know, you can give her a call, and see if she can save you any money.
 
I am looking in idaho since I am technically a resident there. Hoping it is better.

My wife has a good friend who is a business owner that is manipulating the system to get all those benefits. Just not taking a paycheck yet the business pays for everything, has been doing this for a few years. I am too scared to do anything shady and figure I can pay cash for my doctors and pay the fine for not having coverage and still save about 15k a year. It all works well until something big happens that's bankrupt me.
 
Here is a post from another Californian on a web site I frequent. It shows precisely why the system is broken.

Some "lady" at a town hall meeting with a representative or congressman was flamed out.
""My health care was over 400 dollars a month before Obamacare, now it is only 1 dollar, I can't afford 400 dollars a month!"

Really, wow. My wife's health care was about $500 a month BEFORE Obamacare. The first new bill after it passed went up to $700. '
This year it is $850.
So, if she is paying a buck, then I am subsidizing her, almost entirely, because her COSTS didn't go down, just the part she pays.
Because ain't nobody not costing, but only some of us is paying...

This, IMHO, is at the core of what we are facing. More and more people convinced that Socialism is the way to go, thinking they won't have to pay.
And screw the rest of the country, that does pay. In fact, screw the country. Gimmie mine.
Even if the federal .gov gets a workable repeal in place, and gets the ball rolling, this lady, and those of her ilk, are not going to be happy unless they pay one dollar.
They have no concept of reality.
They have no self respect
They have no character, dignity, or sense of personal responsibility. None at all.
Gimmie mine.
They are, in a very real sense, for sale. Selling their political loyalty for what they see as free stuff.
 
The old acronym applies TANSTAAFL (there aint no such thing as a free lunch).

Any way you cut it the piper has to be paid as my mother used to say.

The federal government has a few ways to do it. They can tax you directly with one of the many taxes you pay or they can tax you indirectly in several secret ways they do to fund things outside the free market like this. One is what they did pass a law that requires insurance companies to cover everyone in a supposedly “affordable” way. The companies are now no longer in a free market as regulations are forcing them to change. They can do a couple things they can limit their profits to help pay for the people that can’t and that isn’t fair to the investors who will quickly put their money someplace else. They can cut their salaries as many people think are too high and come up with a minuscule amount in the big picture, or they can pass the cost of doing business on to those that can pay until they can’t. As they have done. Another method they like to do is print money out of thin air and pay for things with that. The problem with doing that is every dollar they print makes everyone you get for working or everyone you have saved worth little bit less. They have done this trillions of times already and workers demand more some at the top get it some at the bottom don’t. That’s how we got the (One Percenters) we keep reading about, but it is really more like the 40 percenters as those are the people working at good enough jobs to be paying all these taxes hidden and others for the other 60%.

Take all the money from the 1% and you won’t make a drop in the bucket of what is needed.

IMO what is needed is one of two things ether let things keep going and water will reach its own level and some point and we will be living a third world class of life of equality, or make this into a country of workers and doers and tax payers.

I heard a rumor that Trump has a new program he plans on putting in place where you can bring your Obama Phone in and trade it in for an alarm clock. This is just a rumor now.
 
This, IMHO, is at the core of what we are facing. More and more people convinced that [selfishness] is the way to go, thinking [that all the poor folks will just disappear].
And screw the rest of the country, that does pay. In fact, screw the country. Gimmie mine.
[And gimme more and more of it.]
Even if the federal .gov gets a workable repeal in place, and gets the ball rolling, this lady, and those of her ilk, are not going to be happy unless they pay one dollar.
(hardly anyone was happy before the ACA either, but that is forgotten)
They have no concept of reality.
They have no self respect
They have no character, dignity, or sense of personal responsibility. None at all.
Gimmie mine.
[and f*ck you if you ain't got any]
They are, in a very real sense, for sale. Selling their political loyalty for what they see as
[an opportunity to have more.]

just sayin':cool:
 
Now where do I fall into this? I can't afford healthcare as it is but I'm not poor so I don't qualify for any discounts.
 
Chris, my friend who makes pretty much minimum wage and can't afford healthcare still had to pay the stupid fee for not having insurance because they said he technically made enough money that he should have to get insurance. So, I agree there. Making people pay a fee for NOT having insurance is BS. Yeah, I understand in theory that if those people need medical then it somehow gets covered by other taxpayers-- but that isn't how it always works. Some people still manage to pay.

I know people who were helped by getting lower insurance costs, but I know others who had to cut some of their kids from their policy in order to be able to afford it. One friend was told her rates would go up by $1k a month if she didn't cut her son from her policy. She removed her son from the policy and they hiked her rates up anyway-- and even more than $1k a month. So, she's paying almost $2k a month and her son isn't even covered.

I do think that insurance companies should be able to cross state lines to offer coverage.

In terms of private vs government, I don't know. I don't have enough knowledge about it. I do know that the government is a total clusterf*** though.
 
Chris, you have options. It sounds (to me) like you want just catastrophic care coverage. My family had that for a couple of years awhile ago.You would be covered for hospitalzation but you would pay all other health costs out-of-pocket.
 
First off, people in my situation get forgotten, Everyone seems to think of the poor and the 1% and all us working class who really are footing the bill get forgotten. The poor think the 1% should pay for everyone and the 1% don't care for the poor. Us working class get stuck with the real bills and nobody seems to care. I am told that I can afford healthcare and shouldn't complain (Doesn't matter that I can't save for my kids education because of it). They look at responsible people like myself to take care of everyone. I for one am sick of it.


If we could get all the people who pretend they are poor or refuse to work to support themselves we would be in a lot better shape. I for one know of several people who milk the system that don't have to. My father in law gets free health insurance and a few other items from the government. There is absolutely no reason he can not get a job. I have a friend that is on every sort of government assistance you could imagine living the same lifestyle as I am with his live in girlfriend and their kid. Once again absolutely no reason he can't get a job. I know another guy real well that hasn't worked in ten years, him and his live n girlfriend get all the assistance, own two homes and he grows pot for extra cash (All legal). Another example of no reason not to get a job. I personally know of at least 8-10 people that do this and I try to avoid people that do this. Now if I personally know these types and all of you guys know these types then really how many are there that are taking advantage of the system? On the other hand I personally know of maybe one or two people that get assistance that truly need it. I personally think that the majority in big city states like California who are on assistance don't need to be on assistance. I know some of you will say that XYandZ reason they can not get a job but these don't even look for work and will avoid work when it is presented.

Maybe we need to go to if you are an able bodied person and are applying for assistance then you have to put in so many hours of community service in order to get benefits?

I just don't get it. I live pretty frugal and I own a fairly successful company and I still can't afford these premiums. I don't finance anything but my home, all my cars are paid for. I have basic TV and we never go out to eat or do things.
 
Chris, you have options. It sounds (to me) like you want just catastrophic care coverage. My family had that for a couple of years awhile ago.You would be covered for hospitalzation but you would pay all other health costs out-of-pocket.

I would love that but it is not an option to me. I can get a plan close to that but it is still almost as expensive as a plan that covers things. I used to have a plan like that years ago and my insurance guy just can't find any anymore.
 
I guess that CA is different...as I have been told :hide::p! I don't disagree that some things still have to change, and I feel your pain (and many others) on this topic. But I think it is still way above all that was happening before.
here's another thought: one of the big problems has always been that when you leave a company, you lose your health coverage...just another form of captive servitude. Instead of allowing tax breaks for corporations who provide health insurance, remove those incentives and let the insurance companies have to compete on the retail level.
 
my friend who makes pretty much minimum wage and can't afford healthcare still had to pay the stupid fee for not having insurance because they said he technically made enough money that he should have to get insurance.

Don’t forget ACA was the first time in the history of this country that the government made you buy something. Your friend didn’t buy it and was fined for not doing so. That amount started out small and would have grown every year if HRC would have been elected and ACA continued. It is like putting a persons head in a vice and saying buy this item and the first year give it one turn the second 2 turns the third 3 turns. Pretty soon you will buy it or quit working and get it for free. So where did that money he paid in a fine go? Not to an insurance company.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top