Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Locobot
*cough* *gag* what? Demand for the what? Who is demanding this besides the private insurance companies? How could a for-profit company better serve the medical needs of population than a non-profit system run by the people themselves? What you're arguing for is actually the status quo in the U.S. - the Republican medical plan - which includes MORE middlemen MORE bureaucracy and MORE people cut off from medical care than a universal state-run system.
Insurance companies' primary purpose is to serve their share holders, not provide medical care. Insurance companies can, and do quite often, themselves declare bankruptcy (a much less punative process than a personal bankruptcy) in which case you've lost your medical coverage and have to start anew with a different company.
I garauntee you Arella, if you have medical catastrophe your insurance will run out long before your need for medical care will. You'll find yourself in a position similiar to Pan's where you'd be better off not working, not contributing, and dropping out.
Ustwo-I love how you complain all the time about people abusing the social welfare systems, yet when someone like Pan refuses to do so he becomes a "martyr."
|
My faimly happens to be in the business so I have an insiders view on what is the objective of private insurers, and also as a consumer myself. As I said, I pay for my own private coverage. The private coverage doesn't guarentee that if something horrible does happen I don't have to pay a cent. That is unrealistic to expect from anyone. It does, however, cover me up to a certian amount. For example, if I were, unfortunatly, in the situation described above, I would only have had to pay 12 thousand instead of the full 20.
I don't beleive you understood my use of the word "demand". I meant demand as in "supply and demand". Insurance companies supply a service (called risk management) and there is a demand for such services because shit happens.
You beleive that government programs are "non-for-profit"? This seems ludicrous to me that you would beleive this and I would like to understand why. If the Government ran under a non-for-profit basis they would take charitible donations instead of taxes.
Yes, it is you who are paying for it. And it is me. I, in my taxes, pay for the risk management (by the government) of thousands of other individuals. I also pay for my own. The taxes I can not help. The individual coverage is just self-responsability.
Indeed, I would be better off - as an individual - scamming the system and letting apathy take over my own beleif in individual economic enterprise. I could save myself thousands of dollars by choosing to live off of the "forced donations" of others.
I would choose not to.
As far as the companies declaring bankruptcy. That is why you shop wisely. Is it the companies fault that they fell under? Yes. Did they foce you to buy their policy? No.
Pan's situation is not ideal, but we all choose whether to take precautions or not. Nothing may ever happen to me in my lifetime and I may die peacfull in my bed, having wasted thousands of dollars on healthcare coverage that I never used. Okay then, I will take that over being sick, or having the risk of being uncovered anyday.