There should be a safe zone where you can explain why NOT single payer health care

[BurtWorm]

And I volunteer this thread for that purpose. It's important to debate reasonably about this.

I support a single-payer system because I think it's the only way to promote the public good of health fairly and equitably. But I invite anyone who wants to argue against it to do so here.

And I ask anyone who wants to counter those arguments in this thread to please try to do so respectfully. Thank you.

[dysfunctional press]

1. okay- one reason NOT to support single-payer is that the planet is already over-crowded...

and by going with a lesser option- like requiring everyone to join an hmo at market rates or some such thing, we can ensure things like a lower life-expectancy and higher infant mortality, that will lead to a slow down of the overall rate of population increase in our country, thereby doing our part to help future generations by keeping their numbers more in check.

[EmilyAnne]

39. Russia has accomplished all of this without single-payer health care. So, you're on to something!

Awesome!

[burythehatchet]

2. YOU SOCIALIST COMMIE PINKO BASTARD!!! (*&^&$&#

just kidding, I want univ single payer

[KamaAina]

5. CALL CONGRESS RIGHT F@CKING NOW!!!!

:P

[county worker]

3. Single payer treats everyone the same as far as care goes.

Care would have to be rationed. People who could afford to pay would not get the chance to pay for what ever care that would be made available to them.

What I am saying is that single payer brings some people up and others down.

Should we take away the choice people have who can pay on their own?

[T Wolf]

6. It depends on if you think that some people are worth more than others, based only on their wealth.

That is a view that would seem to be at odds with Democratic principles.

And an argument can be made that there would not need to be too much, if any, rationing. Once you take the corporate profit and the administrative redundancy out of the system, there may very well be enough funding available to provide care for everyone.

[jaxx]

7. The haves and the have nots?

I thought the idea of health care reform is for all the people being treated the same.

[BurtWorm]

8. In France, they preserve the inequity of the free market system

by permitting a small private sector for health. If you have the money and want to pay for short waits and the kind of upper-end health care American providers aspire to (but rarely reach, I hasten to add), you may do so. But everyone else uses the national system. And France has the best system in the world, according to the WHO, in terms of both availability of the service, efficiency, and results. The US is consistently far down the list in everything but cost.

[eek]

11. Same as in the UK

One may choose to pay for private care. Hardly the grey, Eastern Bloc, rubble-and-barbed wire vision we've been painted.

I honestly do not get why this would bug anyone. You pay for the fancy now, you'd pay for the fancy then.

[muriel_volestrangler]

55. And so, technically, France is not a single payer system

There are co-payments, though you can get insurance for them (and if your income is below a certain amount, the state does that for you): http://www.frenchentree.com/fe-health/DisplayArticle.asp?ID=197

[Threedifferentones]

9. Yes we should take away that choice.

We take away people's choices every day. You do not have the choice of driving 100 miles an hour on a public road. You can't scream swear words at people. You can't kill someone. You can't look at kids naked. You can't pee on a sidewalk or take off your clothes in public. The question is: "does prohibiting a given behavior help more than it hurts?"

If I phrase it as "should I have the choice of taking away basic antibiotics for thousands of kids to put a 200k fake heart in my 75 year old chest," it becomes a lot clearer. And make no mistake, that description of how we practice medicine is much more accurate than the right-wing meme "but people deserve to get the care they can pay for." Capitalism is not a nice or fair game, having money does not prove you deserve health. It proves you deserve a new TV or jet, I guess, but not medicine. If every other medical need is taken care of, you can have your sophisticated synthetic heart. Otherwise, no.

Choosing to bribe doctors to help you anyway should carry a legal penalty, like the actions listed in the first paragraph.

I have heard a lot of discussions about private vs. public medicine, and no justification for privatized medicine has come close to refuting this. Just ask the people of Canada, UK, France, Germany, etc...

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

48. I don't know about Canada.

But in the UK, France, and Germany you most certainly *can* go outside of the public system and pay for a higher level of care. I don't know of any countries that *force* you to use the public system.

[ZombieHorde]

60. "You do not have the choice of driving 100 miles an hour on a public road."

This was legal in Montana years ago, but the Feds became very unhappy with us for our driving freedom.

You can't scream swear words at people.

Many married couple do this all of the time.

You can't kill someone.

True in spirit, but not in any other way.

You can't look at kids naked.

Actually, you can look at kids naked.

You can't pee on a sidewalk

True.

or take off your clothes in public

There are public places in Montana where public nudity is allowed.

[Canuckistanian]

17. Health care isn't "rationed" in any single payer system

Everyone gets treated the same and the priority is based on NEED.

Does that cause waiting times? Yes, it does, but from personal experience, it's minimal here in Canada.
My wife had a hip replacement about 5 years ago and her waiting time was a few months - similar to the US. But then, her need wasn't urgent. And she CHOSE to delay it because she wasn't ready.

As for impatient rich people, you can have a limited number of "boutique" health care clinics to cater for things like MRI or specialized treatments.

But private clinics MUST be controlled in order to limit their access to those who can afford it. If they start going after the less well-off, there is a danger that this "two-tier" system will cause staff and doctors to leave the public system.

We have a totally different mindset about health care here in Canada. It's treated as a RIGHT, not a privilege. And as a right, it's totally blind to the financial condition of the citizens.

[muriel_volestrangler]

56. Your title, and the first sentence of the body of your post, aren't connected

The NHS in the UK prioritises based on need, and treats everyone the same. But that means some treatments that aren't so high in terms of 'need' may not be done. That is rationing. For instance, some treatments for varicose veins:

Other treatments

A number of new treatments have recently been developed to treat varicose veins. However, these treatments may be limited on the NHS, so ask your GP about the availability in your area.

Radiofrequency ablation
...
Endovenous laser treatment
...
Transilluminated powered phlebectomy

http://www.cks.library.nhs.uk/patient_information_leaflet/Varicose_Veins

And it's not just a matter of whether the staff has left to work in the private sector; it's whether the state is willing to pay for enough staff and other expenses for all treatments or not.

[cliffordu]

43. Yes. Make them suffer with the rest of the lumpen.

[Clear Blue Sky]

47. In other countries, there is a market for private care.

Single payer for everyone, but if you don't want to wait for care or want options the single payer doesn't offer, you can go private, paying out of pocket or via insurance you purchase on your own.

[John Q. Citizen]

4. DU admin has said they will create a health care reform discussion group.

But for whatever reason, they keep procrastinating.

I've gotten several direct communications from official email addys where they say they are going to finally get around to creating the forum but then ...

Any way, I'm not one to talk, I'm a terrible procrastinator.

I do think it's a shame that a site as well read and utilized as DU doesn't have a Health Care Reform discussion forum. That would certainly help in archiving information about the issues and the battles.

[NoPasaran]

10. It's very easy to demand "single payer now!"

And denounce anyone who doesn't support it as greedy, kitten-eating bastards, but it does nothing to explain how we're actually going to get there. A few weeks ago the New Yorker ran an article reviewing how the health care systems in various industrialized nations evolved. Whatever changes in health care come about under the Obama Administration, they're likely to be changes that fit in with our political culture. It's not going to be like Stalin setting up collective farms: insurers are not going to to be arrested and liquidated like so many kulaks, regardless of how satisfying that might be to some.

[BurtWorm]

12. But we're not going to get to single payer at all if it isn't on the table.

And if it isn't on the table, then the policy makers are doing a major service to the corporations that benefit from the system as is and a major disservice to those of us (mainly consumers) who suffer from it.

[NoPasaran]

18. Well, I'm not sure that's where I want to go.

But thanks for opening a thread where we can discuss this, not just fling poo.

[BurtWorm]

27. You're welcome.

Glad to see people respecting the spirit in which this thread was offered.

[Greyhound]

16. If HR. 676 were passed today would still take years to fully implement.

As for the insurance and health care denial companies, they would also dissipate and downsize gradually due to fewer and fewer clientele, there is no directive required.

It is this idea that any change must "fit into our political culture", surrenders at the very start the people's rightful position as free and independent, putting them into a subservient position.

[Two Americas]

20. so what?

That is not a legitimate reason that we should not advocate for single payer.

Let the politicians worry about the practicality blah blah - that is what we pay them to do.

We may not see single payer even though we advocate strongly for it. We most certainly will never see it if we do not advocate for it strongly.

Yet you mock people who are doing exactly what we have a responsibility and a duty as citizens to do - advocate strongly for single payer.

[RaleighNCDUer]

32. It wouldn't really be terribly difficult -

You'd have a two-tier system for one year.
1: Create the "medicare for all" system, establish its offices, support network, etc. Roll the existing government healthcare into it -- medicare, medicaid, VA, government employee, etc.

2: the government takes over payment of all existing 'employer' plans, imposing a tax on the businesses which had previously been carrying the insurance premiums - keeping the tax at below 70% of what the employer WOULD have been paying if paying the premiums. The employees keep the same coverage, while the employers see an immediate reduction in healthcare costs. The eventual consolidation into the "medicare for all" system will cover the other 30%. As the employee health plans hit their annual expiration, roll those plans into the government single-payer plan. The business tax will be reduced over time to a nominal amount, to where they will pay in no more than 10% of what they would have been paying for premiums.

3: provide insurance for the currently uninsured through the "medicare for all" plan.

All this will be covered by taxes - based on income, but with no upper cap. The neediest will wind up being exempted from the tax, and it will graduate up to the wealthiest who will likely pay in more than they will ever receive - however, they will be supporting the people who actually create their wealth so they won't really be losing out, either.

After a year, every person will be in the single-payer plan, while the insurance companies move their business into other sectors - 'premium' policies for high-end extras, life insurance, disaster insurance, whatever.

It will hurt the insurance companies, and create a large number of laid-off employees - those those laid off WILL HAVE HEALTH INSURANCE.

It can be done fairly quickly and painlessly. Oh, and those laid off private insurance employees? the majority of them could get jobs working for the public insurance plan, doing basically the same work (unless their job was previously DENYING claims).

[BurtWorm]

36. .

:applause:

[John Q. Citizen]

37. The wonderful thing about fee-for-service tax based single payer is that we know

it works quite well.

Insurance is a socialistic concept. It's based on a socialistic model of spreading risk.

We have single payer retirement insurance (social security) we have single payer FDIC insurance. (Bank deposit insurance)

So our culture is obviously quite used to and accepting of government run single payer insurance systems. We wouldn't have a country without them.

That said, I agree with you that humans are usually creatures of habit, so they are sometimes quite uncomfortable with the notion of change. Look at the break up of the telecoms. That was and still is stressful for some people.

But at the same time, we are capable of change. Sometimes we have to change. If we don't we don't survive.

[tigereye]

51. exactly - I'd really like to see some concrete information about what is

actually being proposed. And folks tend to forget that many of the countries with admittedly a much more compassionate and inclusive system have much lower populations than we do.

[ItNerd4life]

13. I don't support single payer, seriously.

Also, I can't stand the current process we have.

I believe in a hybrid approach, similar to what we have for retirement. People can create their own retirement accounts, but Social Security is there to protect everybody else.

The biggest problem with the current system (as many on DU understand) is the insurance industry and how it runs.
There is no marketplace for getting healthcare.
The other day I asked the nurse how much my treatment would cost. Her response was 'What do you care? Insurance covers it'.
The problem with that is what if I could get the same care cheaper somehwere else? I would go there.

Imagine only having 1 grocery store chain. No choices of grocery stores for your food supplies.
That is the way healthcare would be run with single payer.

Create a hybrid that encourages marketplace forces but has a safety net for those who can't afford it.
The marketplace does an excellent job of keeping services high and costs down if there is the proper regulation (this being key).
I don't see why that can't occur with healthcare.

I say give some states choices to try different programs and let's start to see which programs work best and which don't.

[Fumesucker]

15. The answer to the nurse's question is this..

*I* pay for the insurance, eventually I will pay for the procedure, one way or another.

[Greyhound]

19. Surely you see from the experience of the last 4 or 5 decades that insurance

companies do not compete, they collude, they have done so over and over in every field. So how does this magical marketplace come into being? How does Bill and Martha's Health Care Co. come to exist? The industries are locked up and the only possibility for anything resembling competition comes from another huge corporation deciding to get into the business and, once it has achieved a certain market share, becomes as bad or worse than the others.

As we are seeing all over America today, the corporate model simply is not sustainable, no organization on that scale can compete with government and turn a profit. Medicare/Medicaid overhead is ~3%, the best insurance companies run at 20%, most much higher. Private industry cannot compete and that's why our politicians, mostly Republic but Democratic too, hamstring any agency that is even remotely associated with a private field.

[ItNerd4life]

25. People do shop for car insurance

and that does help keep the costs down.

But I also stated how the industry needs to be regulated.

I've never heard or seen where Medicare overhead is around 3%. I heard it was 50%.
No, I don't have figures to back it up. But do you have figures to back up your 3%?
It would be interesting to see what the GAO says about it.

[Greyhound]

29. You live in Chicago and think auto insurance costs are reasonable?

OK, you can believe what you like, but if that is so, where do the billions in profit come from after the hundreds of millions spent on just advertising? If their costs are reasonable how can they come into, California for example, to keep a a law passed by an overwhelming majority of voters to insure everyone in the state through a small gas tax, tied up in court until the state simply cannot afford to continue the appeals?

If you Google medicare administration costs you will find more links than you want to look at, and notice how the top links are almost all from reich-wing foundations or industry sites trying to convince you that what is known is not really true, but http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/28/washington/28medicare.html">here's one analysis from 2005.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/28/washington/28medicare.html">An interesting piece from the NYT.

http://www.thenation.com/">The Nation has done numerous pieces on this as well.

Basically, even the most dedicated of the "free market" propagandists can't do more than argue around the issue.

[demodonkey]

50. Car insurance pays for wrecks, etc. -- catastrophes. Regular healthcare is not a catastrophe....

It is a basic need and is something that should not be "insurable" because you KNOW you are going to need it.

Healthcare is a basic human right that millions of Americans do not have.

[sinkingfeeling]

21. Part of the problem with what we have today, is that no one can tell you what the true cost of any

procedure really is. I have an itemized bill from my 4-day hospital stay. Ignoring that a half dozen charges never took place, the total is $32,962.50. However, they will settle the whole thing for $19,981.88 from my insurance company and a mere $1926.02 from me. This all comes from some computer program that says you add this charge daily to a patient's bill, used or not. I did not have any respiratory services nor physical therapy, but the charges of over $1K are there.

Went to the dentist yesterday (required to have dental work done prior to my radiation therapy) and they couldn't tell me the cost of a root canal and crown. They have to see how much is 'discounted' from the insurance company.

We need to end the nonsense in our health care system. Why is it that the same dentist who did my last root canal can no longer do it, but I have to visit an endodontist for that? Why do we have endless 'referrals' to specialists, instead of people who actually give a damn about helping someone with a medical problem?

I'm all for single-payer. Single payer would not limit the number of hospitals or doctors. It would perhaps even out the differences in cost to those who have insurance coverage A, those with insurance coverage B, and those who have no insurance.

[ItNerd4life]

23. Not to be gross, but your experience brought to mind

an experience I had in the hospital as well.

I had a charge for an enima. Somehow I think I would have remembered that!
I demanded it being taken off the bill.

[John Q. Citizen]

38. You aren't suggesting people put off a heart attack until the cost goes down, are you?

"I'm going to put off fixing Johney's broken arm until we go see his grandma on summer break. It's 20% less in her state!"

See, single payer IS the hybrid. You pair a government run (we self insure) collection and disbursement system with a privately run health care delivery industry. Private drug companies and equipment manufacturers will actually have to compete on price and efficacy.

I like single payer because I can show you any plan you come up with redone as single payer will deliver more private health care for less money to more people than the non single payer plan you put up.

I say at a bare minimum, write into the law that states can use their federal health care dollars for a single payer statewide system.

[cali]

14. Thank you very much for this thread

I too support single payer, but I know that people of good faith disagree with me on this.

[JoshM5278]

22. opinion from an underwriter

This will be my first post on this site, but i feel i do have something to contribute as I have been a Medical Underwriter for one of the largest Health Insurance companies in the country for over 15 years. Now, i know many automatically feel that all of us insurance workers are foaming at the mouth, twisting our moustaches, devilishly trying to concoct the next strategy to keep poor people sick and rape the country of its health and prosperity. I can tell you that this just simply isnt true. I know for a fact that most of us do want to develop a sustainable, cost efficient, and fair system that promotes individual responisibility for your own health.

The way to solve the Health Care crisis is a very, very simple one.....encourage people to take control of their own health and give incentives to people to become healthier. We have the most expensive health care in the world....#1 reason is becasue Americans are lazy and fat....simple as that. Over 65% of health Care expenses are derived from major medical issues such as Heart Disease and Diabetes. These conditions are directly related to the sedentary and lazy lifestyle we have developed.....and the obesity epidemic.

It is unhealthy, fat lazy people that are destoying the country's healthcare.....NOT just greedy executives. I sure as hell dont want to government telling me what procedure I need and when i can have it....do you? I want to take that repsonsibility alone...as i do through excercise, not smoking and eating well. I have a $2500 dedutible, 80% coinsurance up to $5000 total out of pocket expenses, which most people would think is not a very good plan. I have built up over $6000 in my HSA account so i am completely covered in case something happens that I cant afford. The reason i never go to the doctor, thus increasing costs, is becasue i lead a healthy lifestyle.

Im the first to say that the insurance industry in the past has not done a good job to incent individuals to better their health. We need to delevop plans and strategies to do this....thus lowering the overall cost and explaining to people that going to the doctor or hospital for the sniffles is not what insurance is there for...its purpose is for major medical issues.

Our country simply cannot afford to completely take over through a single payer system....we need to develop plans, through the competitive market place, that gives people an incentive to stop smoking, to eat healthy and to excercise.

There is no one to blame but the lazy and obese....

[BurtWorm]

26. Aren't insurance companies really in business to NOT spend money on health care?

Didn't they get started by basically betting that people who paid them would not need the amount they paid in for health care? And isn't that the fundamental problem with the American system? The people who pay into it are operating under the assumption that the insurance industry will pay for their health care when they need it. It actually pays for them to overuse the system, because then they get more than they paid for. The whole system is fucked up. It's not about health care. It's about payment for health care.

The beauty of single-payer is it solves the payment problem for most people.

I also object to the idea that it's "the government" telling you what health care choices to make. That's no more true than it was (in the days the USPS was totally public) the government telling you whether to send something first class, book rate, certified mail, or air mail. Private providers are just as liable to try to prejudice your decisions based on asymmetrical access to information as a national health system would.

[sinkingfeeling]

30. But you think it's OK for insurance companies to tell people who are paying them what procedures

they can or can't have?

[RaleighNCDUer]

33. Ah, blame the victim.

You know, there is mounting evidence that the obesity epidemic has nothing to do with lifestyle and exercise. That it may be caused by a fundamental immune system disorder - whether caused by environmental sources or a virus is being looked at. It may be, very literally, an epidemic.

A greater percentage of people are getting more exercise on a regular basis than ever before in our history - all you have to do is look at it. I know that in the 60s, before this epidemic began, there were no 'fitness centers' - maybe a local gym, or the Y at best. Housewives didn't jog - NOBODY jogged. Bicycles were for kids only. And EVERYBODY smoked.

We are living FAR healthier lives today than in the 50s and 60s by any empirical comparison. But it is our lifestyles that is to blame?

You might want to look at that again.

[burythehatchet]

34. ohmigod - I doubt your post is sarcasm, but if it were, I would call it brilliant.

[Cerridwen]

35. "There is no one to blame but the lazy and obese...."

No one? Really.

Let me take you back in time. Let me introduce you to HMOs and their purpose as defined by one of their first proponents and defenders...

"All of the incentives are toward less medical care. Because the less care they give them, the more money they make."

Watch the video. Listen to the taped discussion. Watch the video of the announcement the following day.

Now, I understand that to be successful at your job it's necessary to fit in with the corporate culture and adopt your corporation's ideals. This information may be a bit outside your experience of your corporate environment. Good luck with that. Good luck with promoting it on this site.

[Lyric]

40. "#1 reason is becasue Americans are lazy and fat"

Wrong, corporate slimeball. The #1 reason our healthcare is so expensive is because people can't afford to go SEE doctors for preventative care, especially the uninsured. They ignore the pain in their belly, they ignore the weight gain (or loss,) they ignore the toothache, the headaches, the sweating at night, the sudden extreme thirst. By the time things are so bad that they HAVE to go to the doctor, it's too late to step in--the hypoglycemia has become diabetes. The high blood pressure has led to a stroke. The high cholesterol has become full-blown coronary artery disease.

It's a hell of a lot cheaper to PREVENT disease than it is to treat it once it's already there. Ah, but then again, it's also a lot less PROFITABLE, now isn't it?

Americans ARE too fat, overall. But would that still be the case if everyone could afford to see a nutritionist now and then? Or a physical therapist? People often have no idea what it means to eat and live in a healthy way, especially the poor, and without comprehensive, affordable preventative care and nutritional advice, the obesity epidemic is never going to get any better.

[Bluenorthwest]

44. My doctors

all blame greedy, bloated Insurance companies and their bean counting minions who lack medical training but have the arrogance to make medical decisions for others. All the doctors feel that way. As do all the patients. The only people who like Insurance Companies are those that make their dubious living via those entities. Everyone else sees you and your Company AS the problem. The whole problem.

[Spazito]

46. Whoa....

"There is no one to blame but the lazy and the obese...."


Your post is despicable and, it seems, you don't even see it. It seems your place of employment is reflected in your words and that is precisely why single payer health care is needed, imo.

[demodonkey]

49. Hahahahahahah. Very funny. Good one!

:rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl:

[suede1]

54. And the people who age, or have accidents, or genetic problems. or well... for all the people who

aren't perfect and lucky.

[OmahaBlueDog]

57. I'm all for incenting health, but that explanation is too simple and you know it

1. 80/20 major medical can lead to horrid medical decisions. Take sleep apnea. Major medical typically won't pay for a sleep study, and won't pay for CPAP/BiPap (which has an excellent success record), but will pay for expensive nasal surgery with a low rate of success.

2. Discounts for mass buying power are great for most commercial endeavors, but not for health care. If you were a cash buyer with no insurance, you will pay the absolutely highest costs for any medical procedure. The problem is that the cash buyer is most often someone with no insurance. If one is lucky enough to have major medical, one hopes that they've prenegotiated rates, otherwise this leads to problem #3

3. Those who can't afford care can't pay the bills. The unpaid bills lead to debt. The upaid debt leads to higher costs, the higher costs lead to more who can't pay the bills. The unpaid bills lead to more debt......

4. I'll agree that we should incent healthy habits. That makes sense. However, another cost driver are those lovely young couples who have babies and have no insurance. These folks often end up on Medicaid. Medicaid pays for the basics, but often doesn't pay for little things, like anesthesia. This leads to situations where people charge epidurals on Visa cards. Often, these go unpaid. The unpaid bills lead to debt. The upaid debt leads to higher costs, the higher costs lead to more who can't pay the bills. The unpaid bills lead to more debt......

5. Many folks can't set aside $5,000. Even if they could, the fact that people are spending cash will often dis-incent them from getting routing preventive care.

6. Having said all of that, if we had to start with universal $5,000 deductible, I'll take it as a starting point. It is better than nothing.

7. Other simple steps we can take. Government backed malpractice for neurosurgeons, obstetricians, anesthesiologists, and others who have hard time getting insurance in the private markets.

[Cleita]

24. If insurance can cover everyone without deductibles, co-pays, and

with the inclusion of all diseases including pre-existing chronic conditions and end stage diseases, not to mention routine health care and for an affordable premium then I'd say go for it. However, insurance by its nature insures against catastrophes and not done deals. You don't plan on getting in a care accident or for your house to burn down, but you will need preventive health care and you will get sick and you will get old and need health care down the line. Health care is really not insurable and should never have been.

[Vinca]

28. Bingo. We have a winner here.

People who currently have health insurance are living in a fool's paradise. Get a serious, ongoing illness and you'll bypass your lifetime cap and be out in the cold with the rest of us. That happened to a woman in a nearby town so of course now we have bake sales and car washes being held to pay her medical expenses that total $2,500 a day. What a country. Buy a cake for chemo.

[Spike89]

31. For single payer, but have concerns

One of the concerns is that the U.S. currently "subsidizes" an awful lot of research through our outrageous pricing. In other words, the medical industry spends lots of money on building new gadgets and new drugs because they know they can sell these at a high price and get the money back...hospitals can buy a multimillion dollar device because they know they can charge enough to get it back. Knock the profit motive totally out and potentially you'd cripple medical progress, if you don't remove enough, the system can't be supported by taxes.

There is so much money, so many layers, and piles of misinformation out there. However, if U.S. companies can sell pills to Canada at a price so low that resellers in Canada can sell them back to us at a fraction of the U.S. retail, there is a problem. Pull the excessive profits the companies get in the U.S. away from the pharma companies and where are they going to make cuts? I'm guessing it isn't CEO bonuses before R&D. You almost have to nationalize every aspect of the industry.

[PA Democrat]

58. Most of that research is funded by the government or by private groups .

Much of the "research" done by big pharma is for copycat drugs on which they can get new patents to maximize profits.

[harun]

41. Greed, selfishness

Only two reasons I can think of to be against Single Payer.

[Yellow Horse]

42. I'm against single-payer because I don't have a good job and thus if I get sick I deserve to die.

Only the "good" people with good jobs and income should get healthcare.

:sarcasm:

[hunter]

45. If we had single payer healthcare higher wage employees couldn't be held in bondage..

And lower wage employees wouldn't be so fearful and easy to intimidate.

Our society built upon a sturdy foundation of corporate feudalism might collapse. The peasants could very well get uppity and topple the oligarchy in favor of a just democratic republic that respects the human rights of EVERYONE! It would bring an end to the United States as we know it.

[harun]

52. That is why I keep saying Single Payer is massively pro-business

it opens up many entrepreneurial opportunities, if people want to start a business they can attract talent easier. Thus you get more new business and more industry creation.

[hunter]

53. Imagine that. The serfs might wander off and start their own businesses.

We can't have that.

[harun]

59. Exactly.