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Vermont's Single-Payer [health care] Dream Is Taxpayer Nightmare [link only]
Bloomberg [link only] | April 11, 2014 | Megan McArdle

Posted on 04/11/2014 10:58:30 AM PDT by grundle

link only:

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-04-11/vermont-s-single-payer-dream-is-taxpayer-nightmare?cmpid=yhoo


TOPICS: US: Vermont
KEYWORDS:
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Vermont is planning to start a single payer health care system in 2017. It will require $1.6 billion per year in new taxes. In the year 2012, the state collected $2.7 billion in taxes. So this would require a huge tax increase.

But I support states' rights, and I don't live in Vermont, so I don't have anything against Vermont doing this. I view this the way a scientist views an experiment. I'm curious to see how it turns out.

1 posted on 04/11/2014 10:58:30 AM PDT by grundle
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To: grundle

Let us all resolve to eschew the term ‘single payer.’

What statists mean is SINGLE PROVIDER i.e. strict socialized medicine.

The PAYERS (plural) will be the same as usual - the dwindling productive sector.


2 posted on 04/11/2014 11:01:23 AM PDT by relictele (Principiis obsta & Finem respice - Resist The Beginnings & Consider The End)
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To: grundle

its going to be a lot more than expected and fail miserably

I oppose tyranny on the federal AND state level


3 posted on 04/11/2014 11:01:32 AM PDT by GeronL (Vote for Conservatives not for Republicans!)
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To: grundle

I am truly hoping that Vermont WILL do this.

They will be broke in two years.
Will serve as a very visible warning to all the rest of us.

Better it happen to a tiny state with 600,000 people than, say, California.


4 posted on 04/11/2014 11:03:39 AM PDT by Buckeye McFrog
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To: relictele
Let us all resolve to eschew the term ‘single payer.’
What statists mean is SINGLE PROVIDER


Not quite true. In Canada, doctors and clinics are still individual enterprises. But the only way they can get paid is through the "single payer" health plan in that Province. A very small shade of difference, I grant you. Not much benefit in being an independent enterprise if you can be blackmailed by those who control your sole source of income.


5 posted on 04/11/2014 11:06:32 AM PDT by Buckeye McFrog
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To: grundle

I guess it will work like Medicare where you pay the same price each month. So everyone pays 113 dollars a month instead of various amounts. It will save some people money but will increase others. I just wonder about a family with four kids for example. Will that be 113 per person? I think it is a wait and see at this point. Again states rights should always win out. The problem with Obamacare is that it is federal. Each state should decide how they want to do their healthcare.


6 posted on 04/11/2014 11:08:08 AM PDT by napscoordinator ( Santorum-Bachmann 2016 for the future of the country!)
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To: grundle

I’ve been reading that there is a heroin epidemic in Vermont, so all those addicts should be ecstatic that their rehabs will be on the backs of the taxpayers.


7 posted on 04/11/2014 11:16:03 AM PDT by CaptainK (...please make it stop. Shake a can of pennies at it.)
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To: napscoordinator

The idea behind this law is that there is zero direct cost. So there will be no monthly premium or bill at the doctors. The entire bill will be on the taxpayer and there will be no financial restraint on the patient. People will treat the doctor’s office like an open bar at a wedding.


8 posted on 04/11/2014 11:17:43 AM PDT by Straight Vermonter (Posting from deep behind the Maple Curtain)
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To: napscoordinator

“I guess it will work like Medicare where you pay the same price each month. So everyone pays 113 dollars a month instead of various amounts....”
**********************************************************************
Not everyone on Medicare Part B pays the same premium each month. Higher premiums are paid by those whose income is higher. The premiums don’t vary by “risk” but simply by income.

As the DimocRATS would say...”well, it’s only fair!”.


9 posted on 04/11/2014 11:25:18 AM PDT by House Atreides
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To: grundle

Assuming that they can get Medicare and other federal funds transferred into this insanity, the NEW taxes for EVERY citizen in Vermont is $2600 per year, so an average family of 4 is looking at more than $10,000 in new taxes. But wait, let’s do this right - Since less than half of the people actually pay taxes, that’s $20,000 per family they’ll have to suck up.

Average household income in Vermont is $54,000.

Yep, that’s a plan that will work.


10 posted on 04/11/2014 11:30:40 AM PDT by kingu (Everything starts with slashing the size and scope of the federal government.)
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To: grundle
It will require $1.6 billion per year in new taxes

....that's what they say.

11 posted on 04/11/2014 11:32:14 AM PDT by BookmanTheJanitor
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To: Buckeye McFrog

Canada Medicare has its drawbacks. But it works. Health care remains privately delivered but the entire cost of paying for health care is defrayed through high taxes. Every one pays into the system - eliminating the free rider problem.

Of course Americans would not stomach the kind of taxation levels necessary to make it work. That is why single payer has never made much headway here. Even in liberal Vermont, its a hard sell.


12 posted on 04/11/2014 11:35:35 AM PDT by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives In My Heart Forever)
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To: goldstategop

Absolutely true. Most Canadians are honest enough to tell you that “our health care system isn’t free, we pay a tremendous amount in taxes for it”.


13 posted on 04/11/2014 11:42:14 AM PDT by Buckeye McFrog
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To: grundle

bookmark


14 posted on 04/11/2014 11:43:09 AM PDT by Pajamajan (Pray for our nation. Thank the Lord for everything you have. Don't wait. Do it today.)
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To: Buckeye McFrog

Canada’s governments spend around 7-8% of GDP on healthcare. The gov’t portion of US health car spending pre-Obamacare is almost 8%. So actually the two countries are almost the same in terms of what the gov’t spends on healthcare. Canada has single payer but still another 3% of GDP is spent privately on healthcare for things like dentistry, drugs, etc. So Canada with the same amount of resources per the economy covers everyone while the US just covers the poor and elderly.


15 posted on 04/11/2014 12:33:32 PM PDT by C19fan
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To: Straight Vermonter

I haven’t been to Vermont in years, I hope the income of those that live in the Northeast Kingdom has increased.

I never knew what real poor was until I started visiting there.


16 posted on 04/11/2014 12:35:47 PM PDT by Little Bill (EVICT Queen Jean)
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To: grundle
This should be instructive for those who hope -- or fear -- that Obamacare has all been an elaborate preliminary to a nationwide single-payer system. It isn’t. The politics are impossible, and even if they weren’t, the financing would be unthinkable.

JUST BECAUSE IT IS IMPOSSIBLE AND UNWORKABLE HAS NEVER STOPPED THE LIBERALS FROM FOISTING THEIR BAD IDEAS ON THE REST OF US.

17 posted on 04/11/2014 12:38:00 PM PDT by Blood of Tyrants (Haven't you lost enough freedoms? Support an end to the WOD now.)
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To: goldstategop

“eliminating the free rider problem.”

Except for the 47% that do not pay taxes.


18 posted on 04/11/2014 1:10:34 PM PDT by dgbrown
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To: Little Bill
I haven’t been to Vermont in years, I hope the income of those that live in the Northeast Kingdom has increased. I never knew what real poor was until I started visiting there.

It hasn't. The lumber industry was the only thing keeping them going and the state has been working at killing that.

Once IBM leaves the state (coming soon) the rest of us are going to be in a similar situation.

19 posted on 04/11/2014 3:40:08 PM PDT by Straight Vermonter (Posting from deep behind the Maple Curtain)
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To: goldstategop
Canada Medicare has its drawbacks. But it works.

It works largely because US healthcare is readily available. Our hospitals are full of Canadians who cannot get timely care at home. I understand that Florida hospitals are busy in the winter with Canadian patients as well.

20 posted on 04/11/2014 3:42:57 PM PDT by Straight Vermonter (Posting from deep behind the Maple Curtain)
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