Ken's Comments

First step, Repeal Obamacare.  As discussed in the previous article, it has accomplished two things - get more people covered and eliminate pre-existing condition exclusions but it failed in just about every other goal. Why did Obamacare fail?  It is too complicated.  The law tries to micromanage every part of the industry.  Need more competition, we'll artificially create it.  Benefits?  The law says what will be covered.  Pricing - the Federal Government adds multiple layers of bureaucracy to the State layers that already existed.  Selling insurance - we'll "supplement" the current sales methods with an Exchange.  And on and on... The Three Stooges had a bit where they were plumbers and Curly goes into the bathroom to fix a leaky pipe.  At the end of it, he's surrounded by a maze of pipes from floor to ceiling and the leak is still there.  Obamacare reminded me of that.  Everything that someone thought was wrong they adde...

Part 1 of a multi-article post.  This is looking back.  The next will look at alternatives for the future. What went right 1. About 20 Million more people have coverage thanks to Obamacare 2. No more preexisting exclusions What is debatable or uncertain 3. More young people have coverage on their parents policy President Obama touted this during his re-election The counter-argument is that proponents of the law were counting on young people buying individual coverage to offset the cost of older or sicker people entering the market.  How do you reconcile that goal with giving young people coverage for free under their parents' policy?  Is it any surprise that people are complaining now that rates are going up because not enough healthy people bought coverage?  And who are the healthiest people you know?  Those aged 18 to 26 who can now stay on their parents' coverage. 4. Obamacare will make people healthier - on this point the NY Times s...

Friend of mine sent me an article written by John Stossel about the health care or health insurance system in the US.   http://humanevents.com/2016/05/11/free-market-medicine/?utm_source=hedaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl In response to Mr. Stossel's article, I shall suggest that he's both right and wrong.  He's right on the subject of single payer not being such a good idea: - How is that working for people who rely on the Veteran's Administration? - If traditional Medicare was so good, why do so many people buy Medicare Advantage HMO coverage? - Most State Medicaid agencies contract with private HMOs because the States did such a crappy job managing the system themselves, doctors were leaving the networks in droves, people were turning to the ER for primary care services - UK has state run health and everyone who has money buys private insurance - Australia has state run health and everyone who has money buys private i...

I don't have a philosophical argument against single payer health care, I have a practical one. I don't see it working in other countries and I have not seen Government health programs work in the US. England - They have National Health Service (NHS) that covers everything.  However, there is also a strong private care sector in England where people with sufficient money or health insurance can get care.   Canada - They have a version of national health coverage and for a while even banned the sale of health insurance.  Nevertheless, to avoid having to wait for services or to obtain better care, Canadians would travel to the U.S. for health care.  Also, someone challenged the law banning health insurance and their Courts overturned that so they now have a growing health insurance market place. Australia - They have a version of government health coverage where the local governments cover preventive service and the national government provides coverage of inpati...

Hillary Clinton's criticism of Bernie Sanders is that his ideas are pie in the sky while she knows how to get things done.  Let's consider their records on the subject of health insurance. Bernie Sanders advocates a single payer system.  That's a real bad idea but we'll save that for another time.  Hillary Clinton derides this saying it is a proposal that sounds good but won't every get passed. What's Hillary's record on health insurance reform?  Oh yeah, in the early 1990's she gathered together a group of really smart people, held meetings behind closed doors, would not share details with anyone and what did she come up with?  A proposal that started out with bi-partisan support but when people were able to understand how it would work, they realized Hillary's proposal was a really bad idea and it got shot down in Congress. Therefore the choice seems to be Bernie Sanders who Hillary says has a nice idea that can't pass or Hillary Clinton ...