Thread: Health Care Costs Too High?

If health care costs are too high, which I keep hearing everywhere, how is slapping a giant tax on health care benefits going to help? The idea I keep hearing out of the White House is that they'll take those with health care to extend coverage to all those without health care. I see 2 major problems with this.
1) As demand rises, so do prices. If suddenly 20% more people have health care, we'll see a rise in prices across the board, even ignoring the additional tax.
2) If you add taxes to health insurance, some people who can barely afford their insurance now will need to drop it. These people will then go on the government insurance, adding to the cost of the rest of the people who still have their own. These additional taxes will push more people over the edge of needing to drop their health insurance in lieu of the govt. run care, and the cycle continues. Are we going to wait until we have 1% of the people paying for health care for the other 99%?

Originally Posted by freethinkr

If health care costs are too high, which I keep hearing everywhere, how is slapping a giant tax on health care benefits going to help? The idea I keep hearing out of the White House is that they'll take those with health care to extend coverage to all those without health care. I see 2 major problems with this.
1) As demand rises, so do prices. If suddenly 20% more people have health care, we'll see a rise in prices across the board, even ignoring the additional tax.
2) If you add taxes to health insurance, some people who can barely afford their insurance now will need to drop it. These people will then go on the government insurance, adding to the cost of the rest of the people who still have their own. These additional taxes will push more people over the edge of needing to drop their health insurance in lieu of the govt. run care, and the cycle continues. Are we going to wait until we have 1% of the people paying for health care for the other 99%?

The ones who go by the rules, don’t lie about their income will be paying for everyone else and just scraping by like always.

lets see heathcare csts from all sources last year was 2.4 trillion dollars...
thats is enough that if you laid a dollar bill end to end it wuld reach from the earth to the sun and back and then almost halfway back to the sun again

and that was just last year... it equals to 4000 dollars a month for a family of 6 or 48,000 a year per family..... that is more than most families earn in a year.

totally unsustainable... and to top that off taxes collected by the government... won't even make a dent.

Originally Posted by wingrider

lets see heathcare csts from all sources last year was 2.4 trillion dollars...
thats is enough that if you laid a dollar bill end to end it wuld reach from the earth to the sun and back and then almost halfway back to the sun again

and that was just last year... it equals to 4000 dollars a month for a family of 6 or 48,000 a year per family..... that is more than most families earn in a year.

totally unsustainable... and to top that off taxes collected by the government... won't even make a dent.

What was your point? It seems rather elusive. I suspect your last line means that extra tax won't mean much because health care is so expensive already, but surely you wouldn't make such a carelessly poor argument.

No one is talking about the problem: one of cost, not who pays.

There are many ways that the free market can be used to get the cost down and deliver better quality care.

Have you noticed that the elephant in the room (tort reform) is never mentioned by Obama (lawyer) who is beholdened to the bar association? How much could be saved if all these frivalous, exorbitant suits were capped?

Originally Posted by freethinkr

What was your point? It seems rather elusive. I suspect your last line means that extra tax won't mean much because health care is so expensive already, but surely you wouldn't make such a carelessly poor argument.

lok it is a comparison... the government has no money except what we give them and what they print and borrow from other countries... When health cost run in excess of 2.4 trillion dollars a year.. that is unsustainable all they are going to do with this fiasco is sell the future of America .... I will make a bet that America will not exist as we know it in the next 8 years..any takers?

Originally Posted by wingrider

lok it is a comparison... the government has no money except what we give them and what they print and borrow from other countries... When health cost run in excess of 2.4 trillion dollars a year.. that is unsustainable all they are going to do with this fiasco is sell the future of America .... I will make a bet that America will not exist as we know it in the next 8 years..any takers?

And you are the expert on what is sustainable for a particular industry? How do you know what level of health care can be sustained or not? That pretense of knowledge is as bad as the central planners.

They are to high because of a lot of things New technology being one, Illegal Immigration being another, and gov. intervention being the other major issue.

no i am not an EXPERT but I am loaded with common sense.. and it tells me the this administration is on its way to spending 100 percent of the GDP and will tax the rich untill they drive them out of the Country,, eliminate the middle class and then there will be 2 classes in the Country.... Government and Slaves.. so good luck with your future..