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> This is medicare. Would you say medicare is economically successful? Good old late stage capitalism. Because economic success is paramount to all things rig

> This is medicare. Would you say medicare is economically successful? Good old late stage capitalism. Because economic success is paramount to all things right? Certainly more important than increasing the quality of life of citizens.

Domenic_S 9y ago
How does bankrupting the system improve quality of life for all?
- Voloskaya 9y ago
  You assume that having a non profitable healthcare system means bankrupting the entire system. This is false. In France, where the healthcare system is arguably one of the best in the world, it has been losing money since as long as I can remember. So what? The healthcare system looses money and the government injects money back, either directly from taxes or by some other means. I don't know a single french person that would want to get rid of this system even if that means paying less tax, because this very clearly improve the quality of life of everyone.
  - conanbatt 9y ago
    Its also important to see what cannot be seen. Who bears the cost of the most expensive healthcare? And what is the effect of it? > The healthcare system looses money and the government injects money back, either directly from taxes or by some other means. The government doesnt have money. Its your money. There's no difference between the government paying it and you paying it, except the government takes a slice along the way. Government is seldom if ever efficient there. I dont think french people were happy when retirement age was increased, which was to balance the budget. And the spending per capita is amongst the highest in europe. Its not a perfect system. You are also making assumptions by result. You are saying france has great healthcare because its provided by the government, because it has great healthcare. There are no shortage of examples of countries with socialized medicine and disastrous results, so we must dig deeper to have a model we can compare.
    - fao_ 9y ago
      > There's no difference between the government paying it and you paying it, except the government takes a slice along the way. Ok, so why don't you pay for the roads in front of your house privately? Because... guess what, with more money, you can achieve more. > You are saying france has great healthcare because its provided by the government, because it has great healthcare. There are no shortage of examples of countries with socialized medicine and disastrous results, so we must dig deeper to have a model we can compare. Yes, France has bad results, and it is still better than what is available in the US. The fact that you have to find a worse model to compare to your country just means that you're already failing.
      - conanbatt 9y ago
        > Because... guess what, with more money, you can achieve more. Isn't the whole point here that healthcare in the US is spending a lot of money for the results it shows? If money is no problem then this is not a debate. > Yes, France has bad results, and it is still better than what is available in the US. The fact that you have to find a worse model to compare to your country just means that you're already failing. I dont think you got my point. The debate on socialized care in the U.S. has to compare what the U.S. would look like with it. If you compare current US with current socialized France, you will make the mistake of saying "socialized medicine is better" on that sample. Add argentina into that mix, and now socialized medicine doesn't work as well. So you need a different model to compare what is successful and what isnt on each instance.
        Voloskaya 9y ago
        Compare any country with socialized medicine and with a GDP per capita in the same order of magnitude as the US and it's always better. France is not an outlier.
        conanbatt 9y ago
        I can compare US medicare, which is socialized health, with other gdp/per capita countries and say the same. Its still very expensive.
conanbatt 9y ago
We are talking about an economic problem. And if you dont care about quality of life, why would you enter a debate about rising cost of healthcare?
- Voloskaya 9y ago
  > We are talking about an economic problem. It is a societal problem. This system doesn't have to be economically succesful by itself, so it's not an economic problem first. > And if you dont care about quality of life, why would you enter a debate about rising cost of healthcare? Hmmm..What? You probably misunderstood me... I do care about quality of life, and that's why I am shocked by you putting economic success before anything else. The equivalent of medicare in many european countries is not economically successful and loses money every year. But so what? You balance that from some other budgets, or raise more tax. the point of such a service is not to make money or to break even. The point is to substantially improve the quality of life of citizens by allowing them to seek the care they need.
  - conanbatt 9y ago
    > You balance that from some other budgets, or raise more tax. Fun. So if costs are rising, just keep paying more and more, that will solve it! Providing cost effective healthcare is the best way to treat more people. If you make it more expensive, people will get less service. This is basic microeconomics. As simple as that.
    - Voloskaya 9y ago
      > Providing cost effective healthcare is the best way to treat more people. *Providing free healthcare is the best way to treat more people. > If you make it more expensive, people will get less service All countries with free healthcare also have way tighter regulation on the pharma/medical industry than say, the US, so they can't just go and rise the price of medications whenever they want. Just to be clear, I'm not saying we should throw money by the windows and not count what we are paying. We should definitely try to optimize the healthcare system so it costs as little as possible, but having a non-profitable healthcare system is not the end of the world, and is definitely better than what is currently in place in the US.
refurb 9y ago
Economic success is why you're not dying of some random disease in a cave and instead typing on a computer that is a part of a worldwide network. Without economics you can't pay for all the fancy stuff!
- Voloskaya 9y ago
  You don't understand what I am saying. In countries with free healthcare, if you only take the department of health budget in isolation it's of course not going to be an "economic success", and I'm just saying that's ok, we shouldn't expect it to be. Should we expect our armies to be economically successful as well?
  - refurb 9y ago
    Working in healthcare, economic success is much broader than making a profit. Looking at long term cost effectiveness is very common, so I would argue you could say that health care is an economic success.

Domenic_S 9y ago

How does bankrupting the system improve quality of life for all?

Voloskaya 9y ago
You assume that having a non profitable healthcare system means bankrupting the entire system. This is false. In France, where the healthcare system is arguably one of the best in the world, it has been losing money since as long as I can remember. So what? The healthcare system looses money and the government injects money back, either directly from taxes or by some other means. I don't know a single french person that would want to get rid of this system even if that means paying less tax, because this very clearly improve the quality of life of everyone.
- conanbatt 9y ago
  Its also important to see what cannot be seen. Who bears the cost of the most expensive healthcare? And what is the effect of it? > The healthcare system looses money and the government injects money back, either directly from taxes or by some other means. The government doesnt have money. Its your money. There's no difference between the government paying it and you paying it, except the government takes a slice along the way. Government is seldom if ever efficient there. I dont think french people were happy when retirement age was increased, which was to balance the budget. And the spending per capita is amongst the highest in europe. Its not a perfect system. You are also making assumptions by result. You are saying france has great healthcare because its provided by the government, because it has great healthcare. There are no shortage of examples of countries with socialized medicine and disastrous results, so we must dig deeper to have a model we can compare.
  - fao_ 9y ago
    > There's no difference between the government paying it and you paying it, except the government takes a slice along the way. Ok, so why don't you pay for the roads in front of your house privately? Because... guess what, with more money, you can achieve more. > You are saying france has great healthcare because its provided by the government, because it has great healthcare. There are no shortage of examples of countries with socialized medicine and disastrous results, so we must dig deeper to have a model we can compare. Yes, France has bad results, and it is still better than what is available in the US. The fact that you have to find a worse model to compare to your country just means that you're already failing.
    - conanbatt 9y ago
      > Because... guess what, with more money, you can achieve more. Isn't the whole point here that healthcare in the US is spending a lot of money for the results it shows? If money is no problem then this is not a debate. > Yes, France has bad results, and it is still better than what is available in the US. The fact that you have to find a worse model to compare to your country just means that you're already failing. I dont think you got my point. The debate on socialized care in the U.S. has to compare what the U.S. would look like with it. If you compare current US with current socialized France, you will make the mistake of saying "socialized medicine is better" on that sample. Add argentina into that mix, and now socialized medicine doesn't work as well. So you need a different model to compare what is successful and what isnt on each instance.
      - Voloskaya 9y ago
        Compare any country with socialized medicine and with a GDP per capita in the same order of magnitude as the US and it's always better. France is not an outlier.
        conanbatt 9y ago
        I can compare US medicare, which is socialized health, with other gdp/per capita countries and say the same. Its still very expensive.

conanbatt 9y ago

We are talking about an economic problem. And if you dont care about quality of life, why would you enter a debate about rising cost of healthcare?

Voloskaya 9y ago
> We are talking about an economic problem. It is a societal problem. This system doesn't have to be economically succesful by itself, so it's not an economic problem first. > And if you dont care about quality of life, why would you enter a debate about rising cost of healthcare? Hmmm..What? You probably misunderstood me... I do care about quality of life, and that's why I am shocked by you putting economic success before anything else. The equivalent of medicare in many european countries is not economically successful and loses money every year. But so what? You balance that from some other budgets, or raise more tax. the point of such a service is not to make money or to break even. The point is to substantially improve the quality of life of citizens by allowing them to seek the care they need.
- conanbatt 9y ago
  > You balance that from some other budgets, or raise more tax. Fun. So if costs are rising, just keep paying more and more, that will solve it! Providing cost effective healthcare is the best way to treat more people. If you make it more expensive, people will get less service. This is basic microeconomics. As simple as that.
  - Voloskaya 9y ago
    > Providing cost effective healthcare is the best way to treat more people. *Providing free healthcare is the best way to treat more people. > If you make it more expensive, people will get less service All countries with free healthcare also have way tighter regulation on the pharma/medical industry than say, the US, so they can't just go and rise the price of medications whenever they want. Just to be clear, I'm not saying we should throw money by the windows and not count what we are paying. We should definitely try to optimize the healthcare system so it costs as little as possible, but having a non-profitable healthcare system is not the end of the world, and is definitely better than what is currently in place in the US.

refurb 9y ago

Economic success is why you're not dying of some random disease in a cave and instead typing on a computer that is a part of a worldwide network. Without economics you can't pay for all the fancy stuff!

Voloskaya 9y ago
You don't understand what I am saying. In countries with free healthcare, if you only take the department of health budget in isolation it's of course not going to be an "economic success", and I'm just saying that's ok, we shouldn't expect it to be. Should we expect our armies to be economically successful as well?
- refurb 9y ago
  Working in healthcare, economic success is much broader than making a profit. Looking at long term cost effectiveness is very common, so I would argue you could say that health care is an economic success.