Posted on 02/27/2009 5:27:16 PM PST by Kaslin
Health Care: President Obama has unveiled an ambitious plan that he believes will bring down medical costs and provide care for all. What it will do is raise taxes. What it won't do is achieve his goal of "universality."Administration budget plans include a $634 billion "down payment toward a more efficient health care system" and assume that spending large sums will somehow save money.
"The single most important thing that we could do, and the reason that I am committed to getting this budget done this year, is reform the health system so that we bend the curve on health care costs and thereby put the nation on a sounder long-term fiscal trajectory," White House budget director Peter Orszag said when the Obama team announced its spending package.
Washington does not have the cash to pour $634 billion into health care over the next decade. But the administration believes it can generate roughly half — $318 billion — simply by restricting the value of itemized tax deductions for families earning more than $250,000 and individuals making more than $200,000.
The White House is being overly optimistic. Actual entitlement spending has always exceeded projections, and there's no reason to believe that it won't in this case. Making health care "free" to more people will only increase demand. Higher costs will follow.
Ignored by the forces that want to impose a national system on the country, and relevant to the conversation, is government's role in the exploding cost of health care.
(Excerpt) Read more at ibdeditorials.com ...
naaah... ‘Insanity, Paif in Full”
If the pubbies are smart(?), they’ll figure out some way to get this removed from the budget and force nobama to introduce it as a separate bill. (I know nobama can’t introduce bills, but you get the drift.)
The world of medicine has spent generations keeping the supply just about equal to, or perhaps a bit below, demand. Too many doctors, or hospitals or MRI machines, etc. would mean a serious drop in price. So they’ve restricted the number of docs that were trained every year, carefully controlled the adding of hospital beds and expensive diagnostic and treatment equipment. The sudden addition of millions of patients to the demand side of the equation will be a disaster.
The worst possible thing they could do right now is simply agree to use taxpayer money to pay for everyone’s medical care. The system could never tolerate the increased demand and by the time the inertia of controlling supply for all these years was overcome the system would be in shambles.
You think it’s bad now?
Your summation caught my eye and I left England just as the system was struggling. Now in Ontario those that rely on a "free system" soon find out the pitfalls. In one Province, 6% of the population use 24% of the services. What President Obama does not know- or does not care. is the fact of blatant over use of the medical system if it is free.
I have found that certain members of the public are like those who go in for an "all you can eat" offer at a restaurant. They stuff themselves and leave half a plate full. It has to be a wary nurse who is in charge of emergency drop in clinics, trying to sort out desperate individuals and the usual suspects.
I hope America survives this possible onslaught.
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