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I know I'll never change Hacker News's mind on this issue considering the preexisting bias here, but there are ways to sever health insurance from employment ot

I know I'll never change Hacker News's mind on this issue considering the preexisting bias here, but there are ways to sever health insurance from employment other than single payer national health care. For example, the government could equalize the tax treatment of the employer health care market and the individual market. Or the world's 8th largest economy, California, could pass its own universal health care and prove to the rest of the nation that such services are indeed a boon to innovation, and not an anchor as some of us suspect. There are a few of us who have valid concerns about what would be the world's second largest bureaucracy, taking the title from Medicare whose price controls and regulations wreak havoc on the US health system as is (The largest in terms of spending is the US military. But a national US health service could surpass that too). Given the US federal budget deficit, the day is fast approaching where the order of the day will be triaging the old social entitlements of FDR and Johnson, not adding new ones. Now back to your regular-scheduled Democratic Socialism.

orangecat 16y ago
here are ways to sever health insurance from employment other than single payer national health care That's just silly. Next you'll be trying to tell us that people should buy their own food and housing rather than having it provided by governments or employers.
- veidr 16y ago
  Your analogy is flimsy and borderline stupid. Insurance is a fundamentally different thing than food and housing, because of the nature of resource-pooling. That's why there isn't a single country on earth with a working healthcare system that relies solely on people selecting and paying for health insurance on a strictly individual basis. Moreover, without health insurance, many people die slow, agonizing, and utterly avoidable deaths. (In the US, the emergency room will fix your broken femur without insurance, but nobody will treat your long-term cancer or multiple sclerosis without insurance.) For many people, perhaps most, this adds an additional moral dimension to the issue. I hate hearing people make this flimsy-ass argument about health care. "Should the government pay for your clothes too? How about your lawn service?" Health care is a FUNDAMENTALLY different kind of issue. I too have misgivings about the federal government being competent to administer such a program effectively, but pretending this problem can be solved without some form of (fairly massive) collective policy doesn't contribute any value to the discussion.
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
  - yummyfajitas 16y ago
    Insurance is a fundamentally different thing than food and housing, because of the nature of resource-pooling. That's why there isn't a single country on earth with a working healthcare system that relies solely on people selecting and paying for health insurance on a strictly individual basis. Nonsense - there are plenty of insurance systems based on individual purchases (e.g. home insurance, life insurance, renters insurance). Clearly, your reasoning for why private insurance markets cannot exist is flawed (business interruption insurance also involves resource-pooling). Moreover, without health insurance, many people die slow, agonizing, and utterly avoidable deaths. [citation needed]
  - ChristianMarks 16y ago
    The parent post was modded down (it was zero when I read it) due to a disgraceful lack of mathematical ability in the hacker community. I see no other explanation. Insurance has to do with the law of large numbers. Without it, the most elementary business transactions become inconceivable. For competent programmers not to understand the trivial mathematics of risk pools is a cringe-inducing embarrassment. Of course insurance is not like housing. Suggesting that the government act like the insurer of last resort--which is one of its functions--and manage risk to enable markets to function is anything like asking the government to provide universal free housing is ignorant. Some kind of minimal assistance in the form of food, clothing and shelter to the most deprived persons (or the unemployed) is a kind of insurance against misfortunes that could affect anyone, but again this has to do with the law of large numbers. Beyond that minimal level of insurance the government might provide, universal free housing and food has absolutely nothing to do with insurance. What is preposterous is the implicit idea that because insurance encourages risk-taking, the benefits of insurance must be ignored. That's the conservative fallacy of personal responsibility: that the possibility of the slightest cost (in the form of the riskier behavior enabled by insurance) outweighs any conceivable benefit, and that no cost-benefit analysis is possible. The cost of not understanding risk pools includes reduced economic growth, fewer startups and inflated insurance premiums. The lack of mathematical sophistication among hackers on this point should be humiliating.

orangecat 16y ago

here are ways to sever health insurance from employment other than single payer national health care That's just silly. Next you'll be trying to tell us that people should buy their own food and housing rather than having it provided by governments or employers.

veidr 16y ago
Your analogy is flimsy and borderline stupid. Insurance is a fundamentally different thing than food and housing, because of the nature of resource-pooling. That's why there isn't a single country on earth with a working healthcare system that relies solely on people selecting and paying for health insurance on a strictly individual basis. Moreover, without health insurance, many people die slow, agonizing, and utterly avoidable deaths. (In the US, the emergency room will fix your broken femur without insurance, but nobody will treat your long-term cancer or multiple sclerosis without insurance.) For many people, perhaps most, this adds an additional moral dimension to the issue. I hate hearing people make this flimsy-ass argument about health care. "Should the government pay for your clothes too? How about your lawn service?" Health care is a FUNDAMENTALLY different kind of issue. I too have misgivings about the federal government being competent to administer such a program effectively, but pretending this problem can be solved without some form of (fairly massive) collective policy doesn't contribute any value to the discussion.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- yummyfajitas 16y ago
  Insurance is a fundamentally different thing than food and housing, because of the nature of resource-pooling. That's why there isn't a single country on earth with a working healthcare system that relies solely on people selecting and paying for health insurance on a strictly individual basis. Nonsense - there are plenty of insurance systems based on individual purchases (e.g. home insurance, life insurance, renters insurance). Clearly, your reasoning for why private insurance markets cannot exist is flawed (business interruption insurance also involves resource-pooling). Moreover, without health insurance, many people die slow, agonizing, and utterly avoidable deaths. [citation needed]
- ChristianMarks 16y ago
  The parent post was modded down (it was zero when I read it) due to a disgraceful lack of mathematical ability in the hacker community. I see no other explanation. Insurance has to do with the law of large numbers. Without it, the most elementary business transactions become inconceivable. For competent programmers not to understand the trivial mathematics of risk pools is a cringe-inducing embarrassment. Of course insurance is not like housing. Suggesting that the government act like the insurer of last resort--which is one of its functions--and manage risk to enable markets to function is anything like asking the government to provide universal free housing is ignorant. Some kind of minimal assistance in the form of food, clothing and shelter to the most deprived persons (or the unemployed) is a kind of insurance against misfortunes that could affect anyone, but again this has to do with the law of large numbers. Beyond that minimal level of insurance the government might provide, universal free housing and food has absolutely nothing to do with insurance. What is preposterous is the implicit idea that because insurance encourages risk-taking, the benefits of insurance must be ignored. That's the conservative fallacy of personal responsibility: that the possibility of the slightest cost (in the form of the riskier behavior enabled by insurance) outweighs any conceivable benefit, and that no cost-benefit analysis is possible. The cost of not understanding risk pools includes reduced economic growth, fewer startups and inflated insurance premiums. The lack of mathematical sophistication among hackers on this point should be humiliating.