Is Senator Obama? Is the State Senator formerly known as Zelda Gilroy, a woman who advocates a Canadian-style plan for California? Are you? Are any Americans?
I wasn’t until linked (from here to here) to a Mark Steyn column in Maclean’s (a Canadian news magazine) where I saw a box linking this editorial: Fixing a doctor crisis. Apparently, despite having nationalized health care and earning the accolades of Michael Moore and other advocates of a single-payer system, Canada has a shortage of doctors:
five million Canadians do not have a family doctor, one-quarter of Canadians can’t get same-day access to a physician, and wait lists are held responsible for $14 billion in lost annual economic activity
Doesn’t seem that state control has improved things in the Great White North. Noting these problems, the editors weigh in:
The bigger lesson here, however, is that any centralized plan for controlling our complex health care system will inevitably flounder on unintended consequences and bureaucratic hubris.
While Ms. Hillary relies on well-educated experts who work in think tanks and live in ivory towers where they ponder how best to provide health care to the masses, the editors of Macleans live in a nation with a system designed by such experts. And they believe Canada needs health care reform:
There needs to be a greater emphasis on choice, a bigger role for competing private sector delivery, less restrictive public funding models, greater use of technology and, oh yes, more doctors.
Greater emphasis on choice? Bigger role for competing private sector delivery? Are these guys Republicans? I thought they didn’t have conservative in Canada.
Having experienced nationalized health care in Canada, these guys want more choice and competition. Sounds like we could learn from them.
The amusing thing about that article is that the whole problem came about because the Canadian government had to cut health care costs before they completely swamped the budget — so they limited the number of doctors and forced the ones they had to work more for less.
The utter duplicity of leftist health care schemes comes when Hillary, Obama, and the rest of the Democrat Party try to argue that their system will be superior because it will never deny anyone anything.
Thus, once they have lied to the public with that and gotten us all trapped in the system by making private care illegal (as it was for years in Canada), they will proceed to make cuts, just like Canada did.
Of course, we have a doctor shortage in the USA as well. It is particularly acute for specialists in rural areas. We also have a hard time attracting medical students to work as general practitioners as the student loan debt from American medical schools tend to be so high.
Where’s the motivation to become a doctor? If we nationalize healthcare, where are the Canadians going to go to get treatment?
#1
Isn’t private healthcare still illegal in Canada, but they do it anyway?
#2
It’s actually not so much to do with student loan debt. It has more to do with the fact that doctors don’t make that much money unless they go into specialty fields mostly due to the failures of Medicare/Medicaid. I remember working for a doctor in the gay 90s. He was a retired thoracic surgeon (from Dr. Debakey’s team) in general practice, who had several patients driving nicer cars than he did. How does that square with the "rich doctor" stereotype?
And since you brought up student loan debt, why is it that liberals always demand that we spend more money bailing out students rather than demanding that their buddies in "higher education" lower their education prices? They have no problem dragging oil companies before Congress, every 6 months, and waste their time defending their costs. Why don’t they drag the deans of "higher education" in and grill them about theirs?
Answer: They don’t seriously give a rotten damn about "Big Education’s" profits or the debt incurred by students. They just want to earmark more of our money to bail out the students and throw more money at their buddies in "Big Education".
Furthermore, when you have idiots like Michelle Orgasma telling folks not to bother with getting a degree of any sort, how in the hell can we expect to overcome any medical shortages?
2: and don’t forget the critical nurses shortage that exists in this country as well. Â Seems there’s more at play than simple private vs. public health care in the issue of shortage of doctors.
Even if an all government system doesn’t work, the for-profit model in this country sure isn’t any better. Â Even a non-profit, non-government model would be better than what most insured have now (and I’m not even talking about people with no health insurance). Â In any for profit model, the single goal is to pay profits to investors by taking in more money than you spend. Â And how do you do that? Â do your best to make sure you don’t award claims or do your best to even get back the money you’ve paid out. Â I can recall back in early 90s working as a temp at an HMO when I was between regular jobs. Â My job was to edit and reformat documentation. Â Sadly, all the documents I was working on were specifically to teach agents how to deny claims to members. Â Page after page dedicated to making sure that no company money was spent on its customers. Â By lunch time, I was on the phone to my agency asking for another gig and I was done by the end of the day. Â I found this task so morally reprehensible I couldn’t come back.
5: Â Yeah, yet another comment/name calling that raises political debate to an adult level.
I agree that the companies spend too much time denying claims, also they spend too much pushing paperwork mandated by various layers of government. If there were more competition in heath insurance, there would be fewer denied claims.
Even a non-profit, non-government model would be better than what most insured have now (and I’m not even talking about people with no health insurance).
Then take the billions of dollars that rich Democrats like Pelosi, Kennedy, the Clintons, Obama, Edwards, Soros, and the like have and build one.
But why do that, when you can keep your money and use the power of government to force others to pay for it?
Meanwhile, the fact that leftist liberals who insist that no claim should ever be denied run Medicare and Medicaid should be more than obvious.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22184921/
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22202073/
As Americans we should be grateful that we had the USSR to teach us the evils of a communist system. That it eventually leads to a lazy unmotivated populace. We can now thank our neighbors in Canada for their failed socialized experiment with health care. We didn’t have to go through the horrible conditions and wait lines for everyday care that Americans take for granted. There may be doctor shortages in rural areas of America. But we are free to move in our country to areas that offer good schools, good hospitals, low taxes, etc. How tragic for Canadians to have to move their families, to another country, just to get normal doctor care.
Oh, no. If everyone had health insurance they would all want to see a doctor and you might have to wait longer to see one yourself. That settles it then. It’s okay that tens of millions of people don’t have insurance so long as I don’t have to wait. Oh wait. I’m not that hateful and selfish. Never mind.
Millions of Americans CHOOSE to not have health insurance because they are young and heathy and it is unnecessary. They would rather pay for their doctor visit when they travel to a doctor once or twice a year. Isn’t that an odd concept.
The liberal answer to health care is the Canadian, Cuban, USSR, UK model. Look at what you get for the sake of "free" health care, that’s all I’m saying. You get misrable care for everyone. For liberals….that’s fairness.
Profits are life. Literally. If our bodies / cells didn’t make an energy profit on the food/chemicals we take in, we’d all be dead.
Profits are life for organizations, too. No profit = crappy service, followed by death (and the loss of jobs for everyone still working there). Even so-called non-profit organizations must show net financial profits over time, or they die.
Profits-paid-by-the-consumer (as opposed to, say, government) keep the organization interested in the health and success of the consumer. Damn straight, I want to be treated by wealthy, for-profit doctors. But others, apparently, prefer crappy service and severe, permanent doctor shortages.
People come from Canada to the US seeking treatment, not the other way round. So-called "free" medical care is actually slave medical care. Doctors and patients alike are slaves to the government. This has worked out so brilliantly for Canada that in 2005, a top court in Quebec found that Canada’s system is a basic human rights violation.
As for which candidate has the best health care proposal: I was shocked (because I normally think poorly of McCain) to learn that McCain’s plan has a remarkably good element to it. I believe he wants to end the tax loophole / incentive whereby people expect to get health insurance from their employers, rather than purchasing a "portable" policy themselves. Why is this good? I shall explain.
The U.S. is the only country in the world where people expect health benefits from their employers. This system began in the 1940s and 1950s, when a certain, misguided corporate tax loophole kicked in and made it possible for corporations to "increase" their employees’ salaries, tax free, by paying them in company health benefits, instead of wage/salary dollars.
The hitherto-thriving private insurance market was gutted. And, people became isolated from the real cost of medical decisions. People walked around saying "Does my policy cover this?" Instead of, "Do I really need this?" The problem in America today is not that people are uninsured or under-insured; it’s that too many of them are over-insured, resulting in massive waste.
As analogy, imagine if your employer gave you "food insurance". As you stalk the grocery aisles, you’d heap your cart with steak and lobster – as long as they’re covered under your policy. The result would be market dysfunction and an explosion of costs.
Then Medicare came along, and let government dictate to doctors what specific services ought to cost (in the government’s supreme wisdom), while also providing a cash cow that doctors could milk if they played the bureaucratic game right, resulting in an even more distorted, inefficient medical system. Finally, the rise of lawyers and expensive torts has further distorted the medical system and raised costs.
I saw all three of these factors at work just a few months ago, when my dad was sick. In the end, he only had a virus. Nothing was really wrong with him (except old age + an unusually nasty virus). But the particular HMO bureaucracy he goes to ordered test after test after test after test after test, ultimately totalling tens of thousands of dollars, for the reasons I’ve outlined:
1) It was covered under my dad’s policy.
2) Medicare was insanely reimbursing them for all the tests.
3) They were worried about lawsuits and had to CYA.
As a result, my dad consumed – on doctor’s orders; not his fault – tens of thousands of dollars in medical care that made no difference. That, in a nutshell, is the gross waste and inefficiency of our system today: a system where people are over-insured, providers are freaked out about lawsuits, the government merrily subsidizes all, bankrupting the country, and yet doctors can barely operate or make ends meet.
Anyway, by eliminating the crazy tax loophole that led to today’s situation, McCain’s plan would at least end the problem of people being over-insured.
But Democrats, of course, want none of these problems solved. Democrats – and their fat-cat trial lawyer buddies – make too much money from things staying as they are, or getting even worse as further government controls and subsidies are added, aka socialized medicine.
We need to RESTORE (because we have lost it, and that’s the problem) a free-market medical system, where actors function under real cost incentives and quality and efficiency alike are rewarded.
I can recall back in early 90s working as a temp at an HMO…
Wasn’t that the Clinton 90s when the land flowed with milk & honey and everybody (allegedly) was covered?
Yeah, yet another comment/name calling that raises political debate to an adult level.
Is it more adult to deflect attention from the reprehensible? Is it more adult to ignore those who tell people not to bother aspiring to anything greater in their lives? Seems pretty damn idiotic to me.
And at what point did it become everybody else’s responsibility to pay for one’s healthcare? Used to be that people paid their bills. Sometimes they would barter with the doctor, but they worked it out. Now-a-days it’s up to everybody else to pay for it and it’s no longer the responsibility of the patient.
Liberals don’t understand the concept of personal responsibility and intend to saddle the rest of us with costs. The Plymouth Colony tried Socialism. It didn’t work.
Redistributionism is what it’s all about. Socialized health care, "universal" (everyone waits / dies) health care, "free" (but everyone is a slave) health care, are all just trying to repackage redistributionism.
ILC, you are right.
One, the single biggest reducible cost in the medical system today is the duplicate tests — required if health care providers are to have a snowball’s chance in hell against litigators like John Edwards, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama, all of whom spend hours in court trying to convince people that all physicians and providers are negligent and incompetent.
Easy way to solve it: allow jury trials only for criminal malpractice, and make civil lawsuits only in front of a judge.
Two, the tax issue is a little more complicated. True, it would be nice to eliminate the corporate tax exemption and just send everyone off to purchase their own benefits, but if one has ever worked as an independent contractor, you know that all that does is increase the income tax you pay. Furthermore, tax deductions or credits, inasmuch as they only really pay out once a year, put an unnecessary strain on household finances when you’re paying for insurance premiums year-round.
My solution? Allow employers to pay employees a fixed amount, say $500, per month to purchase health insurance — tax free. If employers choose not to do that, exempt the first $500 an employee makes each month from any form of taxation.
Really, the reason Hillary, Obama, and the rest of the Democrat Party want to nationalize health care is so that they can get their hands on the billions of dollars companies and people pay in premiums each month — and then spend that money on their leftist programs, the same way in which they do Social Security, make people wholly dependent on their government overlords, and cut benefits to pay for it.
I had a conversation with a family member about the miracle of the capitalist profit motive. It is what has made America a great nation. Not a perfect one, but a nation who’s poor people are the envy of most of the world. Liberals would confiscate all profits. Not realizing it is the profit motive that energizes a hard working human to create, improve and invent miraculous things. Without the prospect of improving the human condition for a profit, we would have few of the modern items we take for granted. When Hillary gets her wish and profits are confiscated….all invention will cease in America. But then we will all be equally misrable. And liberals will be finally happy.
BTW was the entire $10 million the Clintons donated to charity given to the Clinton Foundation? Does that really count?
 By lunch time, I was on the phone to my agency asking for another gig and I was done by the end of the day.
So in an 8 hour period, you learned all there is to know about health insurance and how all the companies operate? Well by damn, with that kind of thought process, I ought to be a trauma surgeon by now.
Hell, usually all it takes for liberals to become know-it-alls is a bumper sticker or a KOShole lying point.
Jeremy Bentham is to blame. He came up with the "greatest good for the greatest number" equation. Nationalized health care assumes that everyone will get maximum health attention. As the effort to cover illegal immigrants shows, the "everyone" is an independent statistic, not tied to health care. In other words, the greatest number keeps changing without any external controls. Meanwhile, medicine keeps advancing and the greatest "good" grows without regard to the the size of the population. Standing alone, the "greatest number" of people is an independent variable. Standing alone, the "greatest good" in medical treatment is an independent variable. But nationalized health care changes the equation. It promises that everyone will receive maximum benefit. Now you have a mathematical impossibility. You can not grow the greatest good and the greatest number simultaneously without redefining one or the other. Enter "the estimation of simultaneous probability models." Central economies have to "guestimate" which forces will suddenly change and to plan and prepare for them. This is nearly impossible and has always been the Achilles heel of central planning. (There is no other way to look at nationalized healthcare than as central planning and a central economy.) Very soon, the nationalized health care entity rations health care on the basis of its willingness to pay. Costs are cut through facility investment, professional salaries and feeding the patients through the system on a steady, managed basis. Insurance companies are reactive. They look at actuarial tables and trends and protect themselves accordingly. They make the decision that a wino doesn’t get a liver transplant. Naturally, that fails the greatest good for the greatest number of winos test. A veterinarian friend is driven to distraction by people who are always bringing injured animals they have found. They assume he will care for them at no cost but to himself. Luckily, he can send them on to the SPCA where they are often put down. He can do this because he provides free service to the SPCA one day a week. Which means he does give free service. When a person presents himself at a not-for-profit emergency room, he is seen. His bill may go to the insurance company or to some state or local welfare program or be paid out of pocket. The hospital eats a lot of the cost of emergency room service, but not really. They have their own the estimation of simultaneous probability models and the short fall of income in emergency room service is pumped into the costs of general services for the hospital. That is, until the lost cost emergency room services become overwhelming. At that point, the hospital closes the emergency room. It happens often where too many illegals and indigents show up and the state or welfare system doesn’t pay. Whipping insurance companies is idiot’s play. Insurance is like social security, it is a help, but not a cure. You can total your car and lose the whole amount. But if you have insurance, they will replace the heap you totaled. You don’t get a new one. And if you cause a second car to be totaled, the mean guys at the insurance company figure you as client they don’t need. Health insurance is to help you with your medical problems. Somehow, a silly segment of our society has come to believe that health insurance is a free pass. They also believe that research and development is all volunteer work on the part of drug companies. They also believe that retirement funds, university endowments, savings, IRAs, mutual funds, insurance pools, etc. are not invested in companies that return dividends and growth to their stock holders. These people who think this way are children in a candy store where there are no charges and the sugar does not cause cavities or lead to diabetes. God bless them, they need our understanding. But they still get to vote.
 Whoa! I thought I had created paragraphs!
Soviet health care.
To the extent that there is a doctor shortage in the USA, isn’t it largely driven by the outrageous tort industry? After Texas revamped its liability laws to cap malpractice claims, so many doctors moved to Texas that there was an 18-month backlog processing their licenses.
To fix the health care problems, the first step is to replace a bureaucratic structure that favors lawyers and administrators with a market structure that favors patients and doctors.
You get what you pay for.
I know few obstetricians  who have formed a practice that has sprung from current tort problems. They have closed their practices because of the malpractice insurance costs. Now they travel to hospitals in several states to fill in for vacationing obstetricians. They normally spend about a month. The hospital carries the insurance that covers them and they charge a flat contract fee based on the period of service. They have more business than they can cover. I expect to see more of this type of contract medical labor in the future.
The town these obstetricians call home has a terrific need for obstetricians in private practice. Birth centers with mid-wives get a free ride compared to obstetricians and hospitals. Oh, well.
Ugh! I know A few……. Â (Very tired here….blah, blah, blah…)
Succinct!
As for the doctor shortages: It’s a simple lack of a free market. In today’s lawyer-bureaucrat structure, doctors endure incredible hassles and aren’t permitted to earn enough to make it worth it. So, due to government intervention, the demand and supply curves can’t reach equilibrium. Econ 101.