Thoughts on Health Care

Thoughts on Health Care Did the implementation of employer based health insurance prevent the development of a private health insurance market? Auto, home owner and rental insurance are provided by the free market and are highly competitive. These insurance industries grew as the need for them increased. With employer based health insurance covering most workers there was no market for health insurance. The lowest paid works, who had little or no coverage through their employers and the unemployed were not a viable market. Even the inclusion of the self-employed did not warrant the investment into the creation of a private health insurance industry. The vast majority the potential market was eliminated because they had coverage through their employers. Employer based health insurance was not a well-thought-out plan to provide for Americans' health, but came about as a way to circumvent wartime wage regulations that had nothing to do with health. In 1942, the US set up a National War Labor Board which had the power to set a cap on all wage increases. But it let employers circumvent the cap by offering "fringe benefits", most notably, health insurance. These health insurance benefits created a huge tax subsidy because they were treated as tax-deductible expenses for corporations, but not as taxable income for workers. The new job based health insurance grew rapidly and in only about 20 years millions of people who were previously without health insurance now had coverage. While this may seem like a positive development, it also caused many problems. Employer based health care strengthened unions by providing union involvement in the private health care industry, These plans tied workers to their jobs, which benefited employers, but not workers or the economy as a whole. The quality of the coverage was inconsistent, some plans were excellent, others completely inadequate. This new system provided no public control over medical costs. Most importantly it left the poor and elderly without coverage and created no incentive to develop a market. This allowed the government to step in to provide assistance for the elderly and impoverished by creating Medicare and Medicaid. The "managed care revolution" led to the takeover of 90 percent of employer-based health care by HMOs, most of them driven by profit rather than health concerns. Still, most people get their health care through their employer or Medicare and Medicaid. The private health insurance system is now so complex that even “experts” are unable to fully understand it. The industry spends one-third of its cost on paperwork, waste and profit over and above the cost of actually providing health care. Medicare and Medicaid have been losing money for years and are even more complex than the private industry. All of these problems are due at least in part to an employer-based system, the original intent of which was not to provide quality health insurance to all, but to circumvent wartime wage regulations. We all agree that the United States need to make changes to our current health care system, but how should we accomplish this? Do we want a free market system of health insurance as we have with auto insurance, or complete government control? Do we want companies to compete for our business so as to provide affordable personalized plans from which we can choose? Do we want policies independent of our employment that we can keep or change as we desire? Do we want to create new business opportunities and increase employment as the health insurance industry changes? Or do we want the government to have complete control of the health insurance industry? Or do we want to have these new tax increases required for the government’s takeover of health insurance? Or do we want the governments proven inefficiency, waste and bureaucracy to the normal operation of something so vital as our health insurance? I have been careful to refer to health “insurance” rather than health “care”, the health care provided by hospitals and doctors in the United States of America is the best in the world. The current state of the health insurance in the U.S. was created by government regulation, at least in response to a government regulation. Does anyone actually think that more, exponentially more, government regulation or control is the solution? Some facts were taken from "Doctor Wall Street: How the American Health Care System Got So Sick," from a popular pamphlet on the history of the American health care system available for free download at http://laborstrategies.blogs.com/DoctorWallStreet.pdf

Rewriting Histroy

The rewriting of history by progressive liberals is subtle and insidious. They use many forms of media to change public or general perception. If you don’t believe this is true, ask anyone what is the first thing they think of when you say “Robin Hood”. Almost invariably the answer is “robs from the rich and gives to the poor”.
The story of Robin Hood is not about redistribution of wealth.
It is actually a story of people standing up to tyrannical government.
The Sheriff of Nottingham represents an overreaching wasteful government that is taxing its people into poverty to pay for its waste and excess. Robin Hood takes back the money that was stolen through taxation, and returns it to those people who earned it.
Other than the extreme methodology, Robin Hood actually sounds like a TEA Party guy.

Entitlement

Dear, Mr. President, Senators, Members of Congress, and the National News Media,

Please stop referring to Social Security and Medicare as "entitlements". The government of the United States of America did not give the people the right or claim to the money in these programs. American workers entrusted this money to the Federal Government for the specific purpose of having the government safeguard that money for their retirement and for medical needs upon reaching a specified age.
This money belongs to the people who invested in the programs. The Federal Government broke the trust with the people by changing the laws to access and spend that money in ways other than intended at the inception of these programs.
The government made it into an entitlement for some by allowing many who did not contribute to the programs to collect from them.
We are forced to contribute to these programs and forced to let the same government which has mismanaged and corrupted them, continue to make financial decisions which will affect our futures.
With an abundance of wasteful expenditures in the federal budget, why do you all insist that these programs must be cut? Consider that Social Security and Medicare are entitlements in as much as we paid into these programs so we are are entitled to be paid back.

Cancerous Government Expansion

As Americans we need to ask ourselves how we allowed a government that did very little very well grow into this monstrosity that does so much so poorly. We need to return our government into what it was intended to be, very small yet very effective. Small, because the people are the real government and effective because it is divided into three separate branches each with limited power and authority in order to prevent corruption and abuse. Over the last one hundred years we have allowed our government to extend beyond the ideals on which it was founded, to reach into all aspects of our lives, and to become a drain on our prosperity.

The deficit is not this country’s biggest problem, what we have allowed our government to do is the biggest problem we face in the USA. If we can reduce the size of the government, the size of the deficit and the cost of operating the government will also be reduced. We need to cut back the size and scope of our government, not by reducing the budgets of various agencies and departments, but by eliminating them. A doctor does not cut away part of a cancerous tumor, he removes it entirely. We need to cut away the intrusive and ineffective tumors that have grown in our government. The government employs many people who produce nothing, but restrict the production of citizens who strive to succeed. The United States was created by and has prospered from the individual freedoms of our people, the same freedoms which are being eliminated by the expansion of government.

self-perpetuating weapon of mass destruction

For centuries scientists have been trying to create a perpetual motion machine; a device that would continue to operate indefinitely. Science will never create such a machine, it is impossible for a mechanical device to be self-perpetuating.

However, I believe that man has created the perpetual motion system….liberal government. Once this form of government is set in motion there is no known way to stop it. It expands into all aspects of life growing ever larger and ever more voracious. Furthermore it is the most devastating weapon of mass destruction ever conceived. This interminable parasite will feed on the wealth of its subjects until the subjugated population is weakened and must rely on the government which then grows more extensive and controlling, requiring more sustenance from fewer sources until it has extinguished all wealth and prosperity.

What happens next? I imagine that it will turn on itself and cannibalize the weaker parts until it has destroyed even itself. If we continue on the course we have allowed our government to take, we may soon find out.

drowning the lifegaurd

Since its inception, the media has done a good job of portraying the TEA Party as radical extremists. I don’t consider myself or any of the TEA Party people that I know as radical, unless the concept of reducing the size of the government and lowering taxes is considered extreme, then, I admit and embrace it.

The latest hysteria from the media is over the TEA Party’s stance on the federal budget. They claim that the TEA party wants to take medicine from the sick and food from the hungry. This is simply not true. While the call for smaller government includes reductions in programs that provide assistance, this does not necessarily mean cutting aid to those in need. By reducing the amount of bureaucracy and administration, costs could be substantially reduced without cutting services.

My thoughts on government aid are best described by the analogy of a lifeguard rescuing a drowning man: The first thing a lifeguard is taught is to not let himself become a drowning victim by being overwhelmed by the person he is attempting to rescue. If a person is struggling and flailing about, you offer your hand but keep it just out of reach, the drowning victim’s lunges become focused and controlled and soon he is actually swimming. If a person is too weak to swim or falters in the attempt, he is given a floatation device or a placed in a rescue hold and guided to shore where he can stand on his own.

The government should help people get back on their feet, but many government assistance programs are designed to let people put their feet up and stop trying. When people find that they are better off financially by remaining on government assistance than if they find work for themselves, they don’t even try to become financially independent*. This is fraud and abuse of the system. The government is not meant to support people indefinitely, only to help them to until they can help themselves. The lifeguard is being drowned!

*Check out this link to support this statement

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/entitlement-america-head-household-making-minimum-wage-has-more-disposable-income-family-mak

EPA

The EPA was once a necessary agency to lead in the fight to reduce environmental pollutants and protect the health of the nation. It is now an unregulated bureaucracy which is over stepping the purpose for which it was created, specifically to write and enforce regulations based on laws passed by Congress. Now it is being used to circumvent Congress to enact laws are politically motivated not environmentally sound.