Future of Private Health Insurrance

[tiggertsi]

Originally Posted by The Dude

Other taxpayers didn't pay for poor people visiting the ER. I explained this earlier. Insurance premiums go up for the people who do pay (due to increased costs for the hospital) because most hospitals are required by law to treat patients who come to the ER. "The Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA) is a U.S. Act of Congress passed in 1986 as part of the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA). It requires hospitals to provide care to anyone needing emergency healthcare treatment regardless of citizenship, legal status or ability to pay."

I'm not advocating obamacare necessarily, as I think the single-payer healthcare that many other civilized nations have (canada and some european countries) is a better alternative. It would have also been cheaper.

i would contest that insurance premiums go up more because of profiteering greed more so than any other reason. and i know about cobra and the emtala but where do you get that either of those have any thing to do with insurance premiums going up because on non health care insured people getting medical treatment? can you show me the mechanism that would do just what you describe? i would love to see this described, but i think it's a huge leap to say what you describe IS the reason why insurance premiums and the cost of healthcare in general have steadily risen without looking at the profit factor, the inefficiency factor, the jobs program factor, the fleecing of money factor and a whole myriad of other factors. the bottom line is the healthcare industry and healthcare insurance industry are corrupt and obamacare does nothing to address this whatsoever. this is just like the ridiculous idea of bailing out failing banks and financial institutions without even beginning to attempt to reform the corruption within those industries and i think anyone can clearly see where that has gotten us. also the assumption is that people with no healthcare insurance do not pay their medical expenses. so show me the percentage of those who do versus those who do not. historically speaking healthcare was a lot cheaper 50 years ago and inversely the value of the dollar was more as well. go figure. go talk to any older doctors and i almost would bet donuts to dollars that the vast majority will tell you healthcare 50+ years ago was simpler, cheaper and less controlled by corporate profit interests.

i am glad you are not advocating obamacare. and i agree with you, this could have been done cheaper and frankly i believe if the root causes were addressed that it could have been done without forcing anyone to buy anything or pay a tax.