American car manufacturers-who needs them?

[gdi]

gdi,

It is simply impossible to discuss this with people who don't know the issue - at all.

If you find me hard to deal with, then why do you insist on replying to my posts?

Maybe it would be easier if you could assemble a cogent argument, rather than the foolish % of GDP as the barometer of Healthcare efficiency.

Can even Norway beat the "efficiency" of the Congo at around 3.5% of GDP? There simply is more to Healthcare than the % of GDP spent - though I am sure it is hard to convince your average bureaucrat, or you, of that fact.

So no Olsen - it's not me who doesn't know the issue. I simply do not fall for your nonsense arguments. And I never will - if you had a reasonable approach, then may we could discuss it, but i do not see much hope for that.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Roger, it's worth clarifying on that CIA list that the higher numbers are better, and there are 220 countries total on the list (including a bunch lumped together as the EU). So basically, the US is bottom-of-the-barrel of the developed countries, but better than most of the abjectly poor nations experiencing open warfare.

Sorry, I'd tried to do that with actual infant mortality statistics. You probably can't over-state it though: there are people who think that x parts per billion implies a higher incidence than x parts per million. Sad but true.

It is also worth clarifying that as well as an overall EU figure, there are individual EU nations, so that for example Poland is worse than the USA (171st at 6.93) but for example France is better at 3.36 (217th place).

Tashi delek,

R.

 

[gdi]

I could say the same to you. Five year costs are the sum of money spent in the last five years. This is the simplest breakdown. Adjustments are made to address factors such as risk and markets.

Smokers pay more for health insurance because smoking increases the costs of care. If you don't smoke, you don't pay those increased costs. Simple, really. No different with morbid obesity, pregnancy, or whatever.

Whoever told you that mandated coverages force you to pay for things you aren't at risk for was mis-informed. Repeating those mis-informed statements makes you look mis-informed.

I think we may be viewing this from somewhat different perspectives rather than mis-information.

When I talk about coverage mandates I am talking about the requirements that certain states place on Insurance companies to require particular coverages. While I am not anti-insurance company, I do feel certain they are not apt to provide coverages for free - thus the increased cost of coverage. Here is a link to an explanation that I found quickly:

What Is a Mandate? A mandated benefit is a law that requires
a health insurance policy or health plan to cover (or offer to
cover) specific providers, procedures, benefits or people. The
vast majority of mandates come from state legislatures, though
the federal government has been increasingly willing to impose
mandates.
While mandated benefits make health insurance more comprehensive,
they also make it more expensive. Mandates require
insurers to pay for care that consumers previously funded out of
their own pockets, if they purchased it at all, so insurers have to
pay more claims — and eventually they must raise premiums to
cover those costs. And experience demonstrates that when
health insurance costs increase, more people drop or decline
coverage

Link: http://www.cahi.org/cahi_contents/resources/pdf/TrendsEndsMandatedBenefits2008.pdf

I'm not sure there is a real, functional difference in employer health care plans paid out of wages based on individual and group risk, and a public plan paid under the guise of taxes taken out of wages. There is a real functional difference in for-profit medical clinics and state-run health centers, but at the end of the day I don't think the care itself is all that different. Both systems have pros and cons. It's not like one is spawn of demons and the other is sunshine and puppies.

And in point of fact, we have state-run health plans in the US. The VA system is one example, and it is far from perfect or ideal due to the rampant possibilities for abuse. It's a system that begins to seem organized around the concept of preventing fraud rather than providing care to military veterans.

Again - much agreement with the above...

 

[gdi]

Sorry, I'd tried to do that with actual infant mortality statistics. You probably can't over-state it though: there are people who think that x parts per billion implies a higher incidence than x parts per million. Sad but true.

It is also worth clarifying that as well as an overall EU figure, there are individual EU nations, so that for example Poland is worse than the USA (171st at 6.93) but for example France is better at 3.36 (217th place).

Tashi delek,

R.

Roger - you do well to consider that statistics are not always as they seem.

My understanding of the infant mortality rates is that the very definition of a live birth varies with the reporting countries. One country may count any child showing signs of life after birth as a live birth (US) other countries may actually require other levels of "viability" in order to consider it a live birth (including size, or prematurity)

http://health.usnews.com/usnews/ health/articles/060924/2healy.htm

We have the same problems with Life Expectancy - unfortunate numbers of the accident and homicide rates decrease the the overall life expectancy rates in US. They represent probelms that should be addressed, but unless standardized they cannot be a clear indicator of the quality of the HC system.

So while it may be a convenient statistics that seems a logical comparison - the devil is in the details.

I know a number of people get worked up over a show of support for private healthcare, but that shouldn't prevent people having meaningful, open discussion over its benefits. I understand that our US system is far from perfect - but I feel it can be enhanced by expanding access, rather than scrapping it altogether.

 

[David Murphy]

I guess the only thing I can add to the health care debate going on here is my personal experiences from having lived in Europe and Canada (I and my wife at the time had a few significant encounters with the system: child birth, dentistry, neurology, other stuff. I still have many friends there too). I'd rate the Canadian system as perhaps a little less efficient than say an HMO like Kaiser Permanente. The care in BC seems a little better than Quebec. It would be a better system for some in the USA, but would be a step-down in care for many -- it's nothing magical and it's very expensive tax-wise.

In Sweden the dental care was close to the American standard, a few years behind in technology perhaps, but not too bad. The dental care in England and Germany is a real horror show compared to the US standard - particulary in England. I hate to say it, but most of the dentists in those countries provide care far below the American standard - to the point of inflicting significant pain and suffering on the populace. The German situtation is most surprising given their general scientific and technical prowness.

So to most Americans who think we should should emulate the government run health care systems engendered by the European nanny states, I'd highly recommend trying them first. The devil you know may be better than the one you don't.

By the way I love European style, fashion, history, languages, cuisine, and many other aspects of their great civilizations. I just want American solutions to American problems, and yes that involves a significant component of free market capiltalism and individual choice, even in health care.

 

[40oz]

I think we may be viewing this from somewhat different perspectives rather than mis-information.

When I talk about coverage mandates I am talking about the requirements that certain states place on Insurance companies to require particular coverages. While I am not anti-insurance company, I do feel certain they are not apt to provide coverages for free - thus the increased cost of coverage. Here is a link to an explanation that I found quickly:
Link: http://www.cahi.org/cahi_contents/resources/pdf/TrendsEndsMandatedBenefits2008.pdf

I see what you are saying, and agree that it is a matter of perspective.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Roger - you do well to consider that statistics are not always as they seem...

That's why I used CIA estimates -- I assume they're fairly smart lads and have made such allowances as are possible, from an American perspective. You also have to allow that other countries' standards may be either less rigorous or more rigorous. The link didn't work, by the way.

Perhaps the simplest observation is that in almost 60 years I've tried private medicine (USA), military medicine (father was in the navy) and socialized medicine (UK and France). France wins. Most people I've ever met who have tried socialized and private medicine -- living in a country for several years on end -- agree. Especially my wife, who lived the first 36 years of her life in the USA.

And as I said earlier, it's odd that it is basically the USA versus the rest of the developed world.

As for dentistry, yes, I'd agree that in my experience and that of my wife there seem to be fewer poor dentists in the USA and fewer good ones in the UK, but as our total sample is very small and I've experienced both good and bad in the UK; the only one I tried in the USA was pretty average.

Tashi Delek,

Roger

 

[gdi]

That's why I used CIA estimates -- I assume they're fairly smart lads and have made such allowances as are possible, from an American perspective. You also have to allow that other countries' standards may be either less rigorous or more rigorous. The link didn't work, by the way.

Perhaps the simplest observation is that in almost 60 years I've tried private medicine (USA), military medicine (father was in the navy) and socialized medicine (UK and France). France wins. Most people I've ever met who have tried socialized and private medicine -- living in a country for several years on end -- agree. Especially my wife, who lived the first 36 years of her life in the USA.

And as I said earlier, it's odd that it is basically the USA versus the rest of the developed world.

As for dentistry, yes, I'd agree that in my experience and that of my wife there seem to be fewer poor dentists in the USA and fewer good ones in the UK, but as our total sample is very small and I've experienced both good and bad in the UK; the only one I tried in the USA was pretty average.

Tashi Delek,

Roger

Humm, that link opened for me - here is an alternate which may work http://tinyurl.com/babycount

Others resources on this topic do show the CIA's numbers as the source and I am confident that they have not adjusted for that flaw in consistency.

As for other systems - I have never used the French or other systems so I have no direct experience.

 

[Spoks]

I was shocked and disappointed hearing Obama's speach on the car industry. It was nothing but an attack on US auto workers. What the US auto industry asks for of loans is peanuts compared to what is handed out to, with no questions asked, hedge funds and investment banks, whatever that is, and what use we have for them.

Then there is all this war mongering, barrel rumbling talk on what needs to be done in Afganistan, we constantly had to listen to under Bush. Poor Afgans. What have they done to deserve this?

It turns all hillarious when Airforce One lands in Europe, this Mother of All Business Jets which must be over the top compared to just any extravaganca. Particularly having in mind that the guy riding it is out to borrow money!

 

[jonmanjiro]

Apparently a cartoon that appeared in the Chicago Tribune in 1934 ...

 

[Spoks]

I don't know if anyone noticed: Dow Jones, often named as 'the most reliable empiric stock index of the world's stock markets'. They have decided to cut out, - remove from the index, all shares with a price of 10$ or less...! If these shares would still have been included, the Dow Jones index would have been even lower!

This means that the Dow Jones index no longer can be regarded as a 'comparable empiric study'. It can no longer be reliably compared to itself. But functions now as some weird advertising for the stock market. It will make the stock market - and it's participants, look better.

Where will this end...?

Not only that....

The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) voted Thursday to let US banks set their own prices for assets in earnings reports, regardless of current market prices.

Banks are currently required to calculate their earnings, under so-called "mark to market" accounting rules, according to the current market value of the securities they hold, but the new measure would allow them to value assets using their own internal models where the assets would otherwise be sold into a "distressed" market. Banks have argued that markets are not pricing financial assets fairly, causing credit to dry up and exacerbating the crisis.


This is an argument for allowing them to conceal their losses and cook their financial books. It stands in flagrant contradiction to the supposed commitment to "free market" principles.


Since this crisis is often called a crisis of confidence, it is hardly likely that such a move, making mockery of US bank's balance sheets, will increase investor's confidence across the Atlantic.

 

[MIkhail]

Chrysler and GM are begging for another friggin' $21 BILLION !!!! Pretty soon, we're going to be talking about a LOT of money...


I am so sick of corporations wanting bailouts!!!!!

Let them go away...better yet, run them off, there are plenty of Toyotas, Nissans and other car manufacturers out there that produce better products!

And I will be there with my M3 recording the headlines!!!!

What say you?

I say it simple: you have no fricking clue what you are talking about. On many levels.

 

[Spoks]

I say it simple: you have no fricking clue what you are talking about. On many levels.

You are right. It is far more frightening all the money that the US government (but also several European governments) is going to 'give away' to save the a**es of some powerful share holders of banks and financial institutions.

It can't be a duty of the tax payers to bail shareholders out. Tax payers money should be concentrated on saving peoples savings and pensions, to the extent that is economically responsible.

 

[Roger Hicks]

I say it simple: you have no fricking clue what you are talking about. On many levels.

Much like economists, then.

Cheers,

R.