Nonsense. My company covers 80% of the cost for my insurance. There is no way I could afford to replace it at what it is costing me.
i.e. if health insurance is no longer offered by employers, they would have to find other ways to bring qualified people in. One of those would be higher wages, which they could afford to pay since they were not buying health insurance.
Again nonsense. If no companies are allowed to offer healthcare insurance to their employees then where is the incentive for qualified people to leave, salaries being equal? My employer could easily keep my salary where it's at, say "Sorry for that healthcare thing but blame the government and not us", and I'm still worse off.
You are viewing it from the perspective of what we’ve had so far. I’m talking about a pre-WWII type of system where employers can offer all sorts of things, but health insurance is not one of them.
It is expensive now, you bet. But if the only people purchasing it are the ones using it, prices would fall quickly. You would not believe how cheap health care is to those of us that don’t use insurance. And in a world where insurance companies also paid those prices, insurance would be a lot cheaper.
And keep in mind, I called the idea fascist on purpose. I would never really support a law preventing insurance companies from offering health care as part of their incentive package. I’m pointing out the old axiom, “if you want something to be expensive, just make sure the person using it is not the person paying for it.”
If health insurance was paid for like car insurance, it would be a LOT cheaper. One reason I have not even mentioned is that there could be a lot of customized plans. How about “stroke and cancer only” insurance? That means you pay for broken bone resetting, which is pretty darned cheap anyway.
I believe we would see huge deflation in the price of everything related specifically to health care. Equipment prices, services prices, etc.
But I’m only dreaming. However, not having health insurance, I’m living that dream. When I get health care it is VERY cheap and good. And, frankly, Google has made General Practitioners almost obsolete. I self diagnosed my gout as well as found a cure in ten minutes of Google time AFTER my doctor couldn’t figure out what was causing my incredibly painful and red big toe.
That was the last time I saw a GP and just use google to fix all sorts of stuff.