Low Cost Healthcare

Here we have a third party attempt to inject a simple program on health insurance into the debate.  It seems to be largely modeled after the Canadian experience which has worked well enough for forty years.

Critically, they have understood it is necessary to pass administration downstream to the states.  This is totally necessary.  At the end of the day you have a single payer system however long it takes.  You have lost competition in one sense that must be found in another sense.  This way the fifty plus states and territories are competing with each other to optimize the system.  The first constraint comes from the least prosperous who must pay attention to costs and management.  That disciplines less troubled states to keep the pressure on.

Even more important is that this removes political responsibility from the federal level down to the State level.  I suspect that the actors in Washington have no appreciation for the grief they are opening the door to if they set up a government monopoly out of Washington.  This way the problem completely leaves their world.

The present regime has handed pricing control to an insurance monopoly who continues to drive pricing and costs all of which must accrue to their advantage.  That is why we are subjected to their bleating whenever it looks like we are close to having a working system.

I think that no one fully understands this.  The present regime has abandoned pricing to the insurance companies who are only competing for market share of the consumer’s wallets. They have only used whatever pricing power that they have to optimize their profits.  Their share of the pie is effectively fixed as a percentage so in their world they must expand the pie.  A thousand dollar charge out for a procedure is better for them than one hundred dollars for that reason.

Obviously they do best if they service a third of the population who can pay any price structure they can get away with.  Service costs avoided from the other two thirds passes instead on to the bottom line.  The Government gets the bill for the third of the population who cannot afford any level of insurance at the inflated pricing structure.  The other third simply are not covered.  This system has produced the highest per capita cost for health care in the developed world.

Remember then if you are paying health insurance your dollar represents the $0.75 needed to provide every American as good if not better health care.  Not only are you out of pocket the $0.25, but that one other citizen has not been served and your taxes are paying for yet another citizen.  You likely earned $1.50 in order to pay that $1.00.  Your $0.50 went to pay for someone else’s health care.

That this is wrong should be obvious.  That the business itself is operating with no risk whatsoever should also be obvious.  That this is possible only in a monopoly situation is a reasonable deduction.  It is bankrupting governments by bankrupting the taxpayer. It presently is the only financial system that seems to go on untouched by a severe recession.  Simply put, financial engineers have utterly gamed the medical payments system until it is staggering under its own weight.  As the decline continues, way more people will lose coverage than are acquiring coverage.  I do not know were this disaster will end up, but state level single pay systems are likely to start popping up.

Remember one thing.  The same product suppliers who sell you drugs and other medical supplies are selling exactly the same products in Canada, Mexico and throughout Europe at sharply lower prices and much, much cheaper in China and India.  I also see no creditable evidence that an average doctor is doing better financially in the USA than his counterparts elsewhere.  We are not talking about the stars here. We are talking about that chap in a small town somewhere who has trouble collecting his billings. The single payer system eliminates the cost of collection and unpaid billings for these folks.

When I was growing up, an old country doctor with an excellent reputation passed on.  He lived modestly and the bulk of his estate was in the form of uncollected bills. The single payer system that was then put in place ended that level of financial abuse. These chaps did their work as before, except that they then got paid.

The Low Cost Solution to Providing Healthcare

by  The Association of Mature American  Published on January 25th, 2010

http://www.amac.us/

Now that the “People’s Revolt” has reached Massachusetts with the election of Scott Brown as Senator, a sensible Health Care alternative plan must be found. Please take a look at how AMAC’s plan compares to the other proposals.

The AMAC solution provides changes in our Health Care System that will result in all citizens being covered.  It lowers the cost of medical care and does so within the free enterprise system.  It will cost approximately one-fifth (1/5th) of the cost of the plans presently being proposed in Congress.

There are five points to the plan.

First, the plan is administered by the states using their already existing Departments of Insurance.  No need to create eighty plus new government bureaucracies, as proposed in House and Senate bills.  The already existing National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) will create uniform regulations to govern health insurance programs. Exceptions would be allowed in certain states.

Second, coverage will be required for all, phased in over a four year period.  Individuals would receive tax incentives to help pay the cost.  Those eligible for group insurance would be required to join the plan and employers would pay a portion of the premium.  Tax credits would be given to employers according to a schedule.  A “basic” low cost plan would be available for low income households.

Third, pre-existing medical conditions would be covered.  Insurance plans could not stop payments because of use of the plans.

Fourth, costs would be reduced by:  Reforming medical malpractice lawsuits, establishing peer approved practice protocols to reduce unnecessary tests, allowing incentives to be paid to those who uncover Medicare and Medicaid fraud, encouraging hospitals to review management of their operations and finances (share cost saving ideas) and encouraging competition between providers of medical devices.  Further cost reductions can be achieved by providing incentives for the free market to expand its role.  For example, open low cost medical clinics (for minor illnesses) in stores like Wal-Mart, Sears, and drug stores.  This has already been started by some stores that offer very low prices for generic drugs.

Fifth, achieve massive savings from the Federal government by reducing its size.  As a start, six to eight of the Departments of the U.S. Government will be eliminated and merged into existing Departments.  The funds saved would be put into a separate account to be used to help defray the costs of health care. 

Likewise all government programs would be reviewed with an eye to eliminate or greatly reduce costs during this time of economic crisis.  If we are to provide quality health care for all our citizens, we have got to start making serious decisions.

http://www.amac.us/pdf/health_grid.pdf

USA Less Free

An interesting shift however it is calculated.  That Canada is ranked sixth is no recommendation either.  We should all be tied at number one.  It is noteworthy that Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, and Singapore carry the top spots and Ireland and Switzerland fill out the list.

 

It is worth it to peruse the list.  Obviously economic success is liberating and I am surprised to see India as low as it is.  That may be changing because they have the rules and a system for enforcement that is not run by a communist party.

 

The US has supported a range of naïve solutions to perceived threats at the expense of personal freedoms.  It is wrong and worse, it does not work.  I expect that a general assertion by the electorate for leaders who can show more sense has begun with Brown’s success.

 

Of course we have now pursued legal prohibition of recreational drugs for a full fifty years.  This has financed bloated police departments and a bloated criminal underworld and an optimized black market in the drugs.  We import the drugs form Mexico, Columbia and Afghanistan thus financing their underworld and more critically financing the Afghan insurgency as well as low level insurgency else where.

 

It should be obvious to the blind, dumb and stupid that regulating the industry and its production would slice the legs of all these threats.  We would in fact bring it totally onshore.

 

That several states have cracked the ice by legalizing marijuana is a start at least.

 

Personally, I am death on the abuse of drugs in almost any form, but only a fool today would think prohibition can ever work after fifty years of counter proof.  Even Islam seems unable to stop it and they do execute over it.

 

Perhaps the electorate is not yet feeling the pain yet, but the trend is down and it is the electorate who must correct this drift.

 

The U.S. Isn't as Free as It Used to Be

Canada now boasts North America's freest economy.

 

By TERRY MILLER

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704541004575011684172064228.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopOpinion

The United States is losing ground to its major competitors in the global marketplace, according to the 2010 Index of Economic Freedom released today by the Heritage Foundation and The Wall Street Journal. This year, of the world's 20 largest economies, the U.S. suffered the largest drop in overall economic freedom. Its score declined to 78 from 80.7 on the 0 to 100 Index scale.

http://sg.wsj.net/public/resources/images/ED-AK833_index2_NS_20100119142047.gif

The U.S. lost ground on many fronts. Scores declined in seven of the 10 categories of economic freedom. Losses were particularly significant in the areas of financial and monetary freedom and property rights. Driving it all were the federal government's interventionist responses to the financial and economic crises of the last two years, which have included politically influenced regulatory changes, protectionist trade restrictions, massive stimulus spending and bailouts of financial and automotive firms deemed "too big to fail." These policies have resulted in job losses, discouraged entrepreneurship, and saddled America with unprecedented government deficits.

In the world-wide rankings of economic freedom, the U.S. fell to eighth from sixth place. Canada now ranks higher and boasts North America's freest economy. More worrisome, for the first time in the Index's 16-year history, the U.S. has fallen out of the elite group of countries identified as "economically free" by the objective measures of the Index. Four Asia-Pacific economies now sit atop the global rankings. Hong Kong stands in first place for the 16th consecutive year, followed by Singapore, Australia and New Zealand. Every region of the world maintains at least one country among those deemed "free" or "mostly free" by the Index.

Columnist Mary O'Grady discusses the Heritage Foundation's Index of Economic Freedom for 2010.

Some countries, notably Britain and China, have followed America's poor example and curtailed economic freedom. But many others—such as Poland, South Korea, Mexico, Japan, Germany and even France—have maintained or expanded economic freedom despite the global crisis. Ignoring the pressures of recession, these enlightened nations have continued to liberalize their economies, granting their entrepreneurs and consumers greater freedom. As a result, the average Index score dropped only 0.1 point in 2010. Eighty-one countries out of the 179 ranked recorded higher scores than in 2009.

These trends are important because study after study shows a strong correlation between economic freedom and prosperity. Citizens of economically freer countries enjoy much higher per-capita incomes on average than those who live in less free economies. Economic freedom also has positive impacts on overall quality of life, political and social conditions, and even on protection of the environment. Perhaps of most significance in these hard times, Index data indicate that freer economies do a much better job of reducing poverty than more highly regulated economies.

The public sector can't match the vitality of the private sector in promoting growth. Governments, even those that promise change, are primarily agents of the status quo. They tend to reflect the views and needs of those already holding political or economic power. Even democratic nations have their vested interests. Real change, however, can happen when those outside the mainstream have the freedom to try new things: new production processes, new technologies and new methods of organizing workers and capital.

It is common these days to dismiss as simpletons or ideologues those who speak in favor of the free market or capitalism. An honest assessment shows otherwise. Economic freedom, as represented in the Index of Economic Freedom, is a philosophy that rejects economic dogma, championing instead the diversity that follows when entrepreneurs are free to choose their own paths to prosperity.

The abiding lesson of the last few years is that the battle for liberty requires perpetual vigilance. President Obama professes desire to foster prosperity, environmental protection, poverty reduction and better health care. How ironic, then, that his economic proposals so consistently ignore or even undermine the one system—free enterprise capitalism—that has proven best able to achieve those goals.

Now America's once high-flying economy is barely crawling forward. Americans deserve better, and they can do better—as soon as they reverse course and start regaining the economic freedom that made America the most prosperous country in the world.

Mr. Miller is director of the Center for International Trade and Economics at the Heritage Foundation. He is co-editor, with Kim R. Holmes, of the "2010 Index of Economic Freedom" (471 pages, $24.95), available at heritage.org/index.

Guaranteed Health Care in Iraq?

It is remarkable that just about every country on Earth can figure out that the single payer system of supplying health care actually is the most practical delivery system. It even got written into their bloody constitution in Iraq.
Core service delivery is easy to define and support. And if you need more, you go pay for it. Is that not reasonable?

What gets covered quite naturally is emergency intervention and life saving actions. Less immediate needs tend to go begging a bit. But to be fair the line must be put somewhere and there will always be folks inconvenienced.
As noted in the Huffington Post, a health care system was imposed in Iraq quite along the lines of the Canadian system, aided and abetted by American politicians. At the same time a full one third of Americans simply do without.

This is ultimately the direct result in a profound flaw in the US political system that sets every representative up to be bought and sold by financial self interest. The pressure is unrelenting and compromise on legislation is little more than an orgy of trading.

The insurance industry and finance industry have gamed their industries and want no reform. Thus they spread the loot around to prevent movement.

All that has to happen is a state or two to unilaterally establish a new single user system and the music will stop. Perhaps North Dakota should join Canada’s system!! It was Saskatchewan going alone that brought in the Canadian system. Everyone thought they would go bust.


Guaranteed Health Care In Iraq - But Not For You

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-dorlester/guaranteed-health-care-in_b_280528.html

You'd better sit down, folks.

Article 31 of the Iraqi Constitution, drafted by your right-wing Bushies in 2005 and ratified by the Iraqi people, includes state-guaranteed (single payer) healthcare for life for every Iraqi citizen.

Article 31 reads:

"First: Every citizen has the right to health care. The State shall maintain public health and provide the means of prevention and treatment by building different types of hospitals and health institutions.

Second: Individuals and entities have the right to build hospitals, clinics,or private health care centers under the supervision of the State, and this shall be regulated by law."

There are other health care guarantees, including special provisions for children, the elderly, and the handicapped elsewhere in the 43-page document.

Under force of arms, President Bush imposed his particular idea of democracy on a people not asking for it - perhaps a noble undertaking in one context and a criminal violation of international law in another.

Bush's followers are proud of the Iraqi Constitution, a model for the world, they told us.

So, according to the American political right-wing, government-guaranteed health care is good for Iraqis, but not good for us. Not good for you. They decry even a limited public option for you, but gleefully imposed upon the Iraqis what they label here as "socialism," with much Democratic Party member support.

Indeed, reading the Iraqi Constitution so near to the 8th anniversary of September 11, 2001 is instructive. It is the very definition of American right-wing hypocrisy.

We have (thus far) sacrificed more blood to wrest Iraq from tyranny than we lost on 9/11. In addition, according to the Congressional Research Service, as of May 15, 2009 (Report 7-5700/RL33110) we have spent and/or authorized $864 Billion in military operations on Operation Enduring Freedom, which includes Iraq and Afghanistan. The overwhelming majority of those funds have been for the war in Iraq. Additional secret funding has been authorized for intelligence and special operations.

The total is more than (or, in the worst case, equal to) the funding required to guarantee minimally decent health care here.

In other words, the most senior members of the Republican establishment - and some Democrats like Max Baucus (D-MT) - have gladly spent more taxpayer funds to ensure health care as a Constitutional right in Iraq than they are willing to spend to give you any level of guaranteed coverage.

The source document I used is from the official United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq. If you'd like to download and review the full Iraqi Constitution, click HERE

This news is an example of the benefit of our online viral information age. The situation was first called to my attention late yesterday (September 8) by a long-term blogger, Korkie Moore-Bruno, on a think tank list of Obama supporters. Korkie posted an alert from her Facebook friend Jubal Harshaw. Give them credit for the heads-up; all I've done was verify the rumor with the United Nations.

It would seem that U. S. citizens might find out if their Representative and/or Senators have supported or voted to fund the war in Iraq. If so, do they support health care as a civil right for you?

If the answers to those questions are "yes" and "no," respectively, you might consider less hypocritical representation.

Rise of Tar Sands and new Energy regime.

While the press has slept over the past year. the prices of oil has rather quietly risen from $60 per barrel to the current $95 per barrel. It has happened without geopolitical excuses or a catastrophic drop in specific production anywhere. It has happened because no single producer can ramp up production to take advantage of this rising demand.

This past two months, the price has been moving against the historical seasonal trends and just yesterday the projected inventory gain of 500,000 barrels turned out to be a 3,800,000 barrel deficit. Obviously everyone has accepted the fact the price of a tank of gas is going up. It is also going to be costlier to keep the house warm this winter. This should begin the first gentle wave of oil usage contraction.

I started reporting on this story back in July because all the evidence that was available strongly supported the emergence of a production crisis. It could no longer be increased to make up even for declines. It has been called global peak oil and will certainly be remembered as such. More importantly, the only government in the world that has moved forcefully in an attempt to stay ahead of the problem has been the Canadian Government, and that only because they could with the tar sand resource.

The massive long term investment cycle needed began with the first oil crisis in the late seventies. The government and its industry partners committed the huge financial resources necessary to solve the production problems. Thus while Canada's conventional production peaked at around 1,000,000 barrels per day and has since declined, the production of synthetic crude from the tar sands has moved Canadian production to a current plus 3,000,000 barrels and a projected 5,000,000 barrels of production as our likely optimum production rate.

We say optimum under current technology which uses up an unsustainable amount of natural gas. I personally think that the advent of THAI technology, now been proven out will completely change everything. This is toe and heel production which I described in an earlier post. This method also skips the massive impact on the environment of tar sand mining and hot water/surfactant separation.

The real payoff for those who do not understand the tar sands is that the real geological reserve is estimated at 1.6 trillion barrels of oil or more than the rest of the world combined. We have burned about 1 trillion barrels over the past 100 years, so 1.6 trillion barrels of new oil would tide us over very nicely into the next few decades. In addition, there is another trillion barrels of tar in Venezuela with our friend Hugo should we run out in fifty years or so. And of course there are many strat traps around the world loaded with heavy oil that was simply walked away from. Perfected THAI will access all these resources.

Yet Canada is still the only country that has had the foresight to spend the money and years to advance the necessary technology. And even if it were already possible to tap this total resource, Canada would have to achieve production levels of 50,000,000 barrels per day over the next two decades to replace the pending shortfall in global oil production let alone needed growth.

At that production level, the annual depletion will hit 18 billion barrels per year and it will take around a hundred years to clean out the tar sand reserve and perhaps another hundred years to clean out Venezuela and the other smaller reserves we know about. What I am saying is that is possible, though obviously undesirable to sustain a form of our hydrocarbon based civilization for another two centuries at least.

The real long term difficulty is that this is expensive fuel. It compares fairly directly with the expected cost structure of a wood chip sourced fuel which is vastly preferable.

Since a massive new investment in the production of transportation energy is now eminent when the other shoe drops with the rapid decline of global production, it is now that policy makers can redirect that investment energy into the reforming of the global agricultural and forest paradigm.