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goober · #**101** (**permalink**) 04-14-2007

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gort

Goober, loo at the numbers more closely. Traditionally some benefits were available to both medicare and medicaid people simultaneously. Under the new rules that is no longer the case and as a result states are now paying the federal government ofsetting the cost. Where do you think the states are getting that money from? That's right the taxpayer.
The New York Times > Washington > Cost-Cutting Medicare Law Is a Money Loser for States

Moreover at present who is covered by medicare and to what extent? And the cost is how much even with this small population being covered? And how many workers areleft in the work pool to pay for it, and finally which way is that number going?
http://www.kff.org/medicare/upload/7305.pdf
As to the 2% administrative cost issue, apperantly there are some hidden costs Medicare doesn't account for.
Healthcare Economist · Medicare’s (true) Administrative Costs

These articles use some faulty reasoning, I can't link to my source, because it was a two hour conversation I had yesterday with a Health Care Actuary.
He pointed out that medical costs for a 55 year old are triple those for a 25 year old, and as your last link points out, the medicare population is older has much higher per capita claims and so their per capita administrative cost would be closer to the per capita administrative costs of private companies.
This sounds like fine logic, except that most administrative costs are incurred per claim, not per capita, so the comparison of per capita administrative costs is not as valid as the percentage numbers most commonly used.

Even with all the quibbling about just what the difference is, the fact remains that Medicare spends far less on administration than the even the most efficient private insurance plans (which appear efficient because they insure large groups of young people who have very little in the way of claims).

If Socialized Medicine is so bad, why haven't any of the countries that have it voted it out?
I think you'll find that you can collect anecdotal grumbling about any subject you want. There are hundreds if not thousands of posts in this forum where people relate anecdotes that would indicate Canadians are unhappy with their national health system, yet only 2% of Canadians believe the US has a better system. These numbers indicate that it is Americans who are the least happy with their health care system of any rich nation.

Quote:

Percent of people who believe their health care system needs fundamental change:

United States 60%
Sweden 58
United Kingdom 52
Japan 47
Netherlands 46
France 42
Canada 38

The U.S. has the best health care system in the world

Unless a free market solution can be devised, and I seriously doubt the free market model works with health care, certainly what we have in the US is not free market, National Health is the best solution.