We need government health care, because we as a people care so much about the misfortunes of others. Right? Right. Government health care is about doing whats best for the government not whats best for "the people". Its about generating, or trying to generate a new source of income for the Federal coffers while offering a "benefit" for "the people". This has been tried before of course. Social Security was and is a government funding scam designed in such a way that people and politicians would believe that they had a "moral right" to receive the money that they paid in taxes back in the form of benefits. For a more detailed explanation (56 pages of scholarly research) go here.
Some may say, "big deal who cares if the government collects more money in taxes". The only thing that matters is that sick people get the care they need to help them survive.
Except in reality it doesn't work that way. In private insurance, people who are sick are excluded from new coverage if they have a "preexisting condition". The reason is that the insurance company doesn't want to get stuck paying for someone that knows they are sick and only now wants coverage because they don't want to foot the bill themselves. The term for this is adverse selection. Basically these people will only pay premiums if/when they think the benefits they need will be greater than what they pay into the system. Insurance companies try to avoid these "customers" like the plague.
A national system would take care of that problem, so the reasoning goes, because everyone would pay and everyone would get the care they need. Right? Does it work that way now? We have a national system that is supposed to take care of the needs of the poorest. The US has a very costly social safety network that takes care of the neediest, for the common good. That's what all the politicians claim. So what would happen if a really sick person, who needed very expensive care as well as needed public money to pay her bills came along? Do you think the all benevolent federal care givers would gladly send her welfare payment and pay for her health care? That's what they claim is supposed to happen, isn't it?
Why don't we ask Diana Smith about her experience with the social safety net. Diana's story is a heart breaking one. She has a rare form of cancer. She also has a little boy. She is poor and on public support both for her income and for her medical care. In order to get well she needs a expensive transplant treatment. Two things have to happen for her. One she has to get well enough to qualify medically for the treatment. Two, she has to get the Gov to pay for it. The good news is that the government will pay for the procedure if she can get well enough.
So she goes to treatment. She follows the docs advice. She gets better. She medically qualifies for the expensive life saving procedure that will hopefully allow her to return to heath and become a productive person again. It looks like the socialized plan is working the way its claimed it will work.
Except the purpose of the social safety network isn't providing care, its about collecting taxes. Bureaucrats are very good at two things, licking boots and following rules in an endless game of CYA. Nobody wants to pay for the expensive transplant, but they are obligated to. Unless of course Diana somehow is disqualified from receiving the treatment.
I can see it now some medicaid bootlicker case manager breaks the news to his boss. "Well sir the bitch got better and qualifies for the procedure." "Frank, that's going to blow our budget and cost us our effectiveness bonus and my promotion" the boss screams. "Sir I think I have a solution" he replies; "If we raise her income, she won't qualify for Medicaid". "You idiot" the boss says, "She's broke, sick and can't keep a job, that's why she's on medicaid". "How can she make more money"? Easy, they get social security to give her a couple of hundred bucks for her kid. Now she is to "wealthy" to receive public assistance, compliments of public assistance.
And that is one of many ways to screw "the people" out of their "benefits" that we all are taxed for in order to take care of us, for our own good.
In the reports I read, no one is claiming that Diana was intentionally screwed by the bureaucrats. Of course no one is going to without very strong evidence and even then they might not. Fighting the power, is a better slogan, than a career strategy. For the sake of argument lets assume it was all an accidental blunder.
Do you want these jokers, operating at this level of complacency, deciding what care you need?
No comments:
Post a Comment