Posted on 10/26/2013 3:24:43 PM PDT by IbJensen
There is no doubt that President Obama’s health care system promises to fundamentally transform America. It’s been touted as the saving grace of the working class.
But how feasible is it really?
We know it’s essentially a wealth redistribution scheme that takes money from one group of people in the form of forced tax payments, only to shift that money into the pockets of those who didn’t earn it in the form of government subsidies to their health care premiums.
But like all universal programs, the promise of free anything only works so long as you don’t run out of other people’s money.
That being said, a basic analysis of how Obamacare premiums work across the spectrum of America’s wide ranging socio-economic population suggests that it’s dead on arrival.
Once the forced mandates take hold one of two outcomes become inevitable, as noted by The Market Ticker, whose Karl Denninger took a detailed look at the government’s county-by-county premium data.
The consequences of implementation will be disastrous.
Either the Obamacare system itself collapses under its own weight, or the U.S. economy falls apart because of the extreme burden being hoisted on those who are responsible for paying the bill.
Either way, we’re looking at an almost instantaneous collapse of one or the other.
It’s an exercise in basic arithmetic that those who failed to read the bill before passing it should have considered prior to pushing this on the American people by way of a new stealth tax… unless of course the further impoverishment of America is their ultimate goal.
There are several very interesting statistical facts that come from this.
First, if you’re “27″, the average premium is $266.20/month or $3,194.40 per year. How many 27 year olds have an extra $3,200 to spend on this? Remember, this is the price that virtually every uninsured 27 year old must be willing — and able — to cough up in order to prevent the model this system is predicated on from collapsing.
If those 27 year olds don’t show up, and they won’t, then the system collapses instantly. If they do show up because the government threatens them with fines the economy collapses as $3,200 a year exceeds the average 27 year old’s disposable personal income after mandatory expenses (e.g. food, shelter, etc.) Remember, there are always exceptions but these premiums are averages and over large pools of people the statistical averages are what matters — not the ends of the barbell.
It gets better. The “average” 50 year old premium, again, for single coverage, is $452.87, or $5,434.44/year. How many 50 year olds will find that attractive compared against what they’re paying now? Probably more of them, especially if they’re already sick. But how about the healthy ones?
Note two things as well on this account — these premiums are for non-smokers (smoker premiums are grossly surcharged with reports being 2x the above) and they do not account for anyone other than one person. If you are a single parent with kids (rather common) the premium on average is $610.23/month or about $7,300, and if you’re a couple it’s $647.86 (again, $7,774 annually.)
Now let’s look at the government’s own claims. First, the CPI index claims that health insurance is 0.656% of the family budget. What percentage of couples make $1.185 million a year? Why do I ask? Because that’s the alleged median income for a couple if you believe the government’s CPI numbers.
Yeah, right.
Next, while some people will get “tax credits” to offset these costs all that does is lard it up on the federal budget, because someone else has to pay that bill. In other words this is the true cost that will come out of your hide one way or another — either directly by paying, indirectly by taxation, or indirectly by destruction of your purchasing power.
Next, note that this is the “50 year old” premium but you have to be 65 to qualify for Medicare. The price will rise each year after 50 that you happen to be and there are already reports that if you’re 59 these premiums are understated by half. How many couples who are 59 and cannot qualify for Medicare yet have not $7,700 a year of extra money laying around but north of $15,000?
That’s what I thought.
Full Analysis at Market Ticker
The whole idea is predicated on the notion that you can indefinitely take from Peter to pay Paul.
But eventually Peter is going to run out of money and not be able to foot the bill, or he’ll simply refuse to buy into the scheme altogether.
Like everything else government, the new health care initiative will be a complete and utter failure.
The basic principles of mathematics will prove this to be true in coming months and years.
As Denninger notes, America will be “strangled and expire economically as a direct consequence” of the marriage of the State and Health Care industry.
The die has been cast.
bfl
“Something will have to be done when everyone has no healthcare”
But hopefully, conservatives will control congress by then.
——— works so long as you don’t run out of other people’s money.-——
Or so long as The people don’t chop off your head
I wonder how many rights doctors lose under obamacare. I suspect they can’t treat people free if they want. They probably become as helpless of serfs to the government as the patients.
It’s collapse will be blamed on Republicans, corporations, capitalism, talk radio, Bush, Joos.... anything but Obama and Democrats
Cruz America!
I have seen lib comments on other sites longing for German type healthcare. I looked it up and the Germans have to 15.5% of their salary for healthcare.
No, there hundreds that will shift the blame up the contractor chain to the bureaucrat chain where it will be so intense and general there will be no falling on swords.
Obama is not going to have the support he thinks he has. He will be isolated
The world has turned against him and his presstitute minions will too
Yes, when we've finally convinced all the morons of the wisdom of conservative policies, through reasoned debate that leaves out all icky talk of virtue, self-sufficiency, moral hazards, delayed gratification, God....
“But eventually Peter is going to run out of money...”
Okay, but what if Peter gets to print all the money he wants? Will he ever run out? Oh, the money might be useless, but will it run out?
-— Okay, but what if Peter gets to print all the money he wants? Will he ever run out? Oh, the money might be useless, but will it run out? -—
That’s what I’m thinking. As Mark Levin has stressed, “collapse under its own weight” means nothing without a mechanism.
That just brings us back to consequence #2 again...
or the U.S. economy falls apart because of the extreme burden being hoisted on those who are responsible for paying the bill.
(Ping to #15 !!)
The facts are simple and basic and no one talks about them.
1st, the government can not properly manage the most simple thing with which they have been entrusted: Social Security.
Any insurance actuary could get it on its feet, but only so long as the government would give them the power they need and then stay completely out of it.
Social Security is basically the most simple task for the government.
Next is the Post Office. UPS and FedEx have show us that they could run the PO properly, but again it would require that the government stay totally out of it.
Now compare the complexity of the medical profession with the complexity of the two examples above.
The medical profession is probably the most complex profession on the face of the earth. You have everything from the old about to retire university professor looking through his microscope for something no one has every found, and he may not before he retires, to the super medical centers like Johns Hopkins, the many charitable church operated hospitals, the drug manufacturers, the medical equipment manufacturers...from bandaids and stethoscopes to robo artificial limbs....down to the family practitioner.
The very idea that a government agency can manage anything so complex and diverse is so ridiculous that anyone who suggests it should be laughed out of the room.
So obviously we are headed for a disaster far far beyond the problems with the web site, the costs, taxes and even the loss of personal liberty.
The medical profession as we know it will be destroyed.
Your care giver is going to be Kathleen Sebelius.
How does that sound?
there it seems to be going
Libs famously do not know what they’re talking about when they talk about Euro ways of doing things.
Do they talk to Germans?
Do they have German friends? Do they interview people in Hollywood who’ve been there and back?
The Germans - here’s what they do- they pay enormous taxes. Many have one car per family, and they can, because of the way things are set up.
They live for the government. They attend church (every religion except Islam) at a rate of about less than 10% per capita.
They wait on long lists for medical care, they pay their doctors.
They do not give government money to people who don’t work. They wouldn’t allow it, though, when the Wall came down they were not happy to pay for the socialist East Germans not used to working.
They walk and ride bikes everywhere. They don’t live on processed food. They treat their illnesses with natural remedies with much less regulation than we have. They think we are way too fat.
And they don’t give high tech medical care to the elderly.
They do not get married. They are not having kids to replace population.
And they take Sundays off. Everything is closed. This is good for health, god commands it, so it must be good, but they do it as a carry over from former times.
They take much vacation during the year and they are very mindful of reducing stress.
They do all this because it comes naturally to them and also because they are ordered to live like this.
Americans want to do whatever they want and they would reject the German way of being told what to do, in a second. But that’s part of their success, if that’s what it is.
And they don’t have the military expenses we have.
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