Oh - then you have a veritable smorgasbord of choices! You're like a kid in a candy store....that has 3 kinds of chocolate bars only.
Quick question: Do any of you know why Health insurance got tied into jobs? I'll give y'all a second to see who knows.
And three times as many as me too. And an infinity times as many compared to the 50 or so percent of US citizens who cannot afford insurance. Neat.
Maybe you should try actually reading the thread you are posting in before posting. As in, specifically post #6 would be a good place to start.
Fair enough, and the wage freeze was in WWII. I've stated what I think is the best resolve on this. Sad part is I am thinking about moving from my current job, so I went in to the Doctor today to get a full exam. Even told the doctor. He didn't like me leaving my current job until an endoscopy is done. If you have health insurance for years, transferring shouldn't create a new elimination period. It's r****ded.
See and that's a disaster IMO. My sister was going to start her own business a few years ago, hated her corporate job, was just about to put in her notice, and then found out she was pregnant. She had to stay in that job just to pay for the costs of the pregnancy/baby. A joke IMO
Not only would a national health care system allow people the freedom to start their own businesses, it would help put us on an equal footing with other countries when it comes to major international companies looking to expand. All else being equal, given the choice between a country where they have to pay $8,000 per year per person for health care and one where care is government subsidized, which do you think the company would choose?
Really? Because I have had coverage over the last 20 years with FOUR different companies. I have lived in Houston and College Station, Texas. I have had coverage with: Aetna Blue Cross Unicare United Healthcare That does not seem like much of a monopoly. As for quantifying the number of people that have a choice, I can tell you that every person that has their benefits through Administaff has a choice. Administaff is a large company. Thinking of it that way does not answer the question, but is a good start.
Jesus, you don't even need to read the links that I posted - You people should read your own posts. Your employers have offered you four different companies over 20 years - FOUR! And that's your example of the freedom you have to choose and how the market is competitive.....Incredible how you have been conditioned to believe this. I was just at the drug store downstairs. They at least 40 different kinds of toothpaste. They had tooth paste for every need. At least 10 different brands. They had whitening toothpaste. They had kid's toothpaste. They had gel toothpaste. They had that nasty baking soda toothpaste. They had all natural toothpaste. They had tubes. They had the squeeze pumps. They had large sizes. They had small sizes. The reason why? Even though several large companies (johnson & johnson, P&G) probably dominate the toothpaste market, Toothpaste is still a competitive market. J&J can't raise their prices every year....somebody would come in and beat them. Further, since people actually have input as to what toothpaste they want, and better information, there's a ****load more market segments offered Health insurance is not this way. Your anectdotal evidence supports this...as does the empirical evidence...read the links bro.
just to clarify why wages were frozen. this happened during wwii, the government froze wages because of the lack of labor due to the war. employers were raising wages to get employees from other companies, the government wanted to make sure they had enough workers in the industries crucial to the military effort.
I will review the links when I have a little more time. Your initial point was that one or two companies enjoy a virtual monopoly in any given market. My response was to show you that there are double that in Texas. You respond by saying that double that is still not choice. I can tell you that there are at least seven companies (3.5 times the number you claim enjoy an oligopoly in any given market). Aetna, Cigna, BC/BS, Unicare, Celtic, United Healthcare and Humana. Each of those companies offer quite a few insurance products (deductible, PPO/HMO, etc etc). It certainly is not one size fits all.
You have cumulatively had your choice of FOUR companies over 20 years. FOUR. Sure it's "Double", it's also Infinity times zero plus 4. There are certain decent sized cities in Texas (Midland, e.g.) where one company enjoys 80%+ market share, with the next largest competitor having a market share in the single digits. Some choices there! And most of these stick to their own regional markets - UHG has a pretty small presence in Texas compared to its size overall; this is why you only have had FOUR of these choices made available to you............ over 20 years. Please read this study and then get back to me, note the HHI scores. For a frame of reference, anything over 1800 is considered a "highly concentrated" market: http://www.ama-assn.org/ama1/pub/upload/mm/368/compstudy_52006.pdf The more interesting question for me at this point is not whether or not the market is competitive - but why you want to believe it is in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, and when your personal experience shows otherwise Politics? Something else?
The troubling thing in the study is that apparently one or two insurers can have over half the market in any given locality. Accordingly it can reasonably be argued, and is probably likely, that the quality of coverage suffers. This is why I have made a number of posts advocating the idea of the co-ops. I generally favor most ideas that actually increase the level of competition for products in which there are significant barriers to entry. If the co-ops provide decent or good coverage at an affordable price, the message to the insurers is "provide a better product for the money or die on the vine." I realize that a single payer system is not on the table right now, but a lot of people have wanted to talk about it. My concern with a single payer system is that all competition would be gone. You would have your choice of ONE healthcare product...ever. Since we are talking about competition, I assume that this is not what you would advocate either. I am open to any and all ideas that would increase competition. I have been much more fortunate than most in some of the choices I have had. I have always had a number of products to choose from and pick one according to my likely needs. The plan I am on now provides me with excellent coverage, assuming I never need more than $3 million in benefits.
I would rather defend 10 different American created liberties that later worked counter productively with markedly increased costs to everyone that stifles attaining future liberties, than consider 1 socialistic solution that has evident benefits to a better quality of living for all Americans. Signed - a U.S. patriot
Wow! Now we will have five! We're moving on up! And the people who can't afford todays now only has one. Your argument is illogical in regards to competition.
Red herring. The topic at hand is whether there is true competition in healthcare. SamFisher has made a good point regarding the lack of competition. The idea here is to attain more competition...not less.
How exactly would one achieve more competition between massive insurance companies? They've allegedly been competing since they were formed - and we're still in the mess we're in today. As far as I can tell, these massive bloated cashcows just try not to step on each others toes - the only real competition here is between the consumers and the insurance companies, and the insurance companies are winning. The "free market" will not fix the healthcare system in this country - even if we could somehow reset it from the beginning, it'd end up right back in the ****ty situation it's in now. This is not a problem that's going to be solved by the "free market" - capitalism has had its chance, and it's gradually turned our healthcare system into a massive cluster****. It's time for something different.
