QUOTE(zachafer @ Nov 29 2006, 11:14 PM)
agreed.
washington state is 100 percent democrat lol
*slaps* shut up before you know what you're talking about. I lived there and still do in december and the summer and I know damn well it's about 60% democrat. Or do you and your arrogant west side of the Cascades never even think about us Eastern part of Washington? Get a map.
Anyways to an extent people should have some public health care. The thing is we should NOT do it like Canada because they are having huge problems right now especially with even more extreme nurse shortages. Doctors and nurses both are getting underpaid so where do they go? The US instead. Anywhere where it's worse for the doctors to go, they will leave. For example in Washington because Gregoir and Cantwell are ignoring the need completely to have a Pain and Suffering cap on lawsuits in Washington State our malpractice insurance is extremely high so therefore our doctors are leaving us. The same thing would happen to a lesser extent probably if we moved to public health care.
Personally I think health insurance in general was a huge, huge mistake and is one of the prime reasons why health care is so expensive. Back in my father's years as a child i.e. 1950s they didn't have health insurance. The doctor only had a couple people working in his practice: himself and his nurses. He didn't need anyone to deal with the insurance companies and thus he didn't have to pay the expensive charges for insurance. My dad's family paid $5.00 in charges per house call which according to
this site was worth $41.85. Now think of how much you have to pay for one now. Without insurance it is DOUBLE that cost assuming you don't have lab tests. To pay for a one hour session with a psychologist is that much as well. And I ask again, why is that? Simply it's the fact that doctors now have to pay people to deal with the insurance companies or they'd be out of business because of them.
Insurance if you look at your bill and then you look at how much you actually spend usually is making them big bucks. Why? They're a business of course and they will do the best to survive. The cases which you would be causing them negative gain are rare and few between such as cancer or a serious accident which is the prime reason people pay insurance companies in the first place, is it not? And sometimes they don't even cover that especially if you're only part time. But then say you DO get cancer. How much money did you pay the insurance companies before you got it? Wouldn't it be close to enough to pay for the cancer bills anyways if we had just set the money aside anyways? That was the case in my father's cancer.
What we need in this country is either extreme circumstance insurance ONLY i.e. heart transpant or cancer or full government control where aid is given based on seen need for it. Instead we should encourage people to set aside money for their health whenever they can. Also it could mean a higher tax rate but honestly I think that it would save us a hell of a lot more money than we are spending right now on health insurance AND this solution will not hurt the doctors very much especially if we also put a limit on the amount of lawsuits made against them. Everyone wins except the insurance companies and thus the American population would be happy since well... from what I hear almost everyone hates them anyways.