And They're Off! The Democratic Candidates for 2020

Started by JBS, June 26, 2019, 05:40:42 PM

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milk

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/elizabeth-warren-is-jussie-smollett/ Here's the conservative hit on Warren from the National Review. Every candidate has their flaws and Warren has made some annoying choices at times. Yet, she seems smart and affable. What say ye? How big are her flaws? Is there any real alternative? To me, Biden, Sanders, Harris and Klobuchar are no-goes.

greg

Quote from: drogulus on October 13, 2019, 03:50:23 PM
What would you be testing? Would it be if health care for everyone would work?
There's almost always unforeseen issues in anything new.

Start in a small area. Once the bad effects are known, people can decide on whether the trade-off is still a net gain. Then gradually expand if it all goes well.

Society is a lot like software. Fix one thing and usually you'll end up causing many issues you wouldn't have thought of. Blind optimism isn't helpful.
Wagie wagie get back in the cagie

Madiel

Quote from: 71 dB on October 13, 2019, 07:44:12 AM
Fire department is a human right in the US. Your house is on fire? Nobody asks if you have a fire plan and which rooms your plan covers. Oh, kitchen is on fire? Sorry, your silver plan doesn't cover kitchen! You need our golden plan for that and it costs $500 more than your $1000 silver plan. They come and put it out for you. Rich, poor, doesn't matter. Everyone things it's how it should be and even Republicans are not repealing it.

See, you talk about this like it's just a fact. Not a situation that took a long, long time to develop.

Because when fire departments started, they operated by people subscribing to them. You paid a premium so that you were on the list of properties they would come and extinguish fires at. Your neighbour might not have a fire service, or they might have a different fire service to you.

Have a read. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_insurance_mark

I'm not arguing with you that the current system of fire departments is undoubtedly better. But talking about it as if it's just some inevitable way of working shows no awareness that that isn't historically how they worked.
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drogulus

Quote from: greg on October 13, 2019, 05:37:33 PM
Fix one thing and usually you'll end up causing many issues you wouldn't have thought of.

    Medicare has been subjected to plenty of tests. The basic structure exists. Private insurance is shrinking as more employees are priced out.

    Employer/employee based insurance is an affront to capitalism. It suppresses employment, wages and profits, kills innovation with job lock, and will never offer stability.
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71 dB

#844
Quote from: Madiel on October 13, 2019, 05:47:43 PM
See, you talk about this like it's just a fact. Not a situation that took a long, long time to develop.

Because when fire departments started, they operated by people subscribing to them. You paid a premium so that you were on the list of properties they would come and extinguish fires at. Your neighbour might not have a fire service, or they might have a different fire service to you.

Have a read. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_insurance_mark

I'm not arguing with you that the current system of fire departments is undoubtedly better. But talking about it as if it's just some inevitable way of working shows no awareness that that isn't historically how they worked.

That's correct. the US had "fire department for profit" and it didn't work out so they moved to "fire department for all" and it works better.

What this tells us is that "for profit" model doesn't work in everything. It doesn't work in things like fire department and healthcare because the financial incentives become crazy. "for profit" model works in many other things like for example "coffee for profit" (Starbucks) and "iPhone for profit" (Apple). "Coffee for all" on the other hand hasn't been a successful model except on Finnish workplaces, but that's Finland.  ;D   
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Madiel

I have free coffee at my work and I'm not in Finland.
I am now working on a discography of the works of Vagn Holmboe. Please visit and also contribute!

Florestan

Quote from: Madiel on October 14, 2019, 05:03:05 AM
I have free coffee at my work and I'm not in Finland.

In some Romanian companies you can have free coffee, gym, English lessons etc etc etc.
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drogulus

Quote from: 71 dB on October 14, 2019, 04:35:05 AM
That's correct. the US had "fire department for profit" and it didn't work out so they moved to "fire department for all" and it works better.

What this tells us is that "for profit" model doesn't work in everything. It doesn't work in things like fire department and healthcare because the financial incentives become crazy. "for profit" model works in many other things like for example "coffee for profit" (Starbucks) and "iPhone for profit" (Apple). "Coffee for all" on the other hand hasn't been a successful model except on Finnish workplaces, but that's Finland.  ;D   

     You're right.

     Arguments from high principle are as consequentialist as overtly pragmatic ones. You are supposed to be flummoxed by their awesomeness.
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greg

Quote from: drogulus on October 13, 2019, 06:45:30 PM
Employer/employee based insurance is an affront to capitalism. It suppresses employment, wages and profits, kills innovation with job lock, and will never offer stability.
That's definitely the big problem. Shouldn't have to rely on what is usually a bigger company to have decent health insurance. Would be nice to be self-employed and not have to worry about it.
Wagie wagie get back in the cagie

drogulus

Quote from: greg on October 14, 2019, 09:41:51 AM
That's definitely the big problem. Shouldn't have to rely on what is usually a bigger company to have decent health insurance. Would be nice to be self-employed and not have to worry about it.

    Don't worry, for profit health care is a labyrinthine cancer eating away at the economy and now itself.

    There is a view that people like their employer health care. Very few who have it do. I didn't. It was only better than having no insurance.
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JBS

#850
Quote from: 71 dB on October 14, 2019, 04:35:05 AM
That's correct. the US had "fire department for profit" and it didn't work out so they moved to "fire department for all" and it works better.

What this tells us is that "for profit" model doesn't work in everything. It doesn't work in things like fire department and healthcare because the financial incentives become crazy. "for profit" model works in many other things like for example "coffee for profit" (Starbucks) and "iPhone for profit" (Apple). "Coffee for all" on the other hand hasn't been a successful model except on Finnish workplaces, but that's Finland.  ;D

Surprise! I work at a job where there's free coffee every morning! Here in the US!

The problem with for profit health care (and fire departments) is not the financial incentive, but the built in lack of price comparitive shopping. When your house is in fire, you don't have time to find the lowesr price available. When you've got a health emergency or sudden illness, you likewise don't have the chance to check on who offers the lowest fees. In a true emergency you don't even get to pick the ambulance, or the hospital and doctors they take to.

Right wing ideas pretend you can price shop all the time, which suggests they live in fantasy land.

Hollywood Beach Broadwalk

Karl Henning

Quote from: drogulus on October 14, 2019, 10:06:08 AM
    Don't worry, for profit health care is a labyrinthine cancer eating away at the economy and now itself.

    There is a view that people like their employer health care. Very few who have it do. I didn't. It was only better than having no insurance.

Yes.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

milk

Quote from: JBS on October 14, 2019, 10:26:36 AM
Surprise! I work at a job where there's free coffee every morning! Here in the US!

The problem with for profit health care (and fire departments) is not the financial incentive, but the built in lack of price comparitive shopping. When your house is in fire, you don't have time to find the lowesr price available. When you've got a health emergency or sudden illness, you likewise don't have the chance to check on who offers the lowest fees. In a true emergency you don't even get to pick the ambulance, or the hospital and doctors they take to.

Right wing ideas pretend you can price shop all the time, which suggests they live in fantasy land.
I guess it's obvious that the whole discussion coming from the right is dishonest. BTW: I live in Japan where everyone is required to be covered but it's NOT single-payer. If you're not in a company system, which I am thankfully, there's another public system you must get. It doesn't change anything about the doctors you can access, Just how it's paid. Everyone is covered.

drogulus

#853
Quote from: milk on October 14, 2019, 02:37:45 PM
I guess it's obvious that the whole discussion coming from the right is dishonest. BTW: I live in Japan where everyone is required to be covered but it's NOT single-payer. If you're not in a company system, which I am thankfully, there's another public system you must get. It doesn't change anything about the doctors you can access, Just how it's paid. Everyone is covered.

     In America doctors outrank patients like you wouldn't believe how much.

     I haven't yet met my doctor. He's busy with important things.
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JBS

Quote from: milk on October 14, 2019, 02:37:45 PM
I guess it's obvious that the whole discussion coming from the right is dishonest. BTW: I live in Japan where everyone is required to be covered but it's NOT single-payer. If you're not in a company system, which I am thankfully, there's another public system you must get. It doesn't change anything about the doctors you can access, Just how it's paid. Everyone is covered.

That sort of system is the one I prefer, and which would both mesh best with the current system and be most politically palatable.

One question about the Japanese system: is there any tendency for companies to push people in one way or another off their own and into the public system? And if so, how is it dealt with?

Hollywood Beach Broadwalk

Karl Henning

Of course, at present, I am at home, on disability. But at the office, we have free coffee, too.

Finland's advantage there appears to have been exaggerated....
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

North Star

It should be pointed out that in Finland, the occupational health care is significant too - mandatory to provide even if you just have one employee, the costs are compensated by the government. The employer may acquire occupational health care services from occupational health care units at public health centres, municipal enterprises and companies providing occupational health care, occupational health care centres jointly operated by several employers (occupational health care associations), or occupational health care units at private medical centres - or provide it in-house. And there's also a separate student healthcare system founded by the Finnish university students' union in 1954 that recently expanded to cover students in universities of applied sciences too, not just university students. (you pay something like 80 dollars for it at the start of the school year to be covered).
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milk

Quote from: JBS on October 14, 2019, 03:53:34 PM
That sort of system is the one I prefer, and which would both mesh best with the current system and be most politically palatable.

One question about the Japanese system: is there any tendency for companies to push people in one way or another off their own and into the public system? And if so, how is it dealt with?
I should be able to answer this with 100% confidence but I sometimes get confused by this kind of thing. I think companies over a certain size, and that employ you on a regular full-time contract, have to enroll you. It used to be that Japan offered most people lifetime full-time careers. Over the last decade or so, this has been eroded and more temporary contracts have been used. Recently, the government passed new labor provisions like requiring companies to make contracts permanent after a certain number of years. Unlike the U.S., there is not effective enforcement and litigation does not lead to quick and punitive results. Some companies have taken to skirting the law by deception, asserting some kinds of exceptions or have just tried ignoring it. Unions have taken it to court but that process is slow. In the end, the unions are basically prevailing but companies not yet sued are still dragging it out without the kind of fear of punishment you see in the States. Even some big private universities have acted duplicitously and lost court cases.
I think this system basically works and I think the government will end up forcing companies to cover people. Either way, there are premiums, but much less than the U.S. I think. Other problems in Japan come up tangentially like the sharply aging population contributing to Japan having the largest debt in the developed world (relative to GDP) and old people abusing the system by hanging out in hospitals as if it were a social club. Japan delivers pretty good quality medicine relatively efficiently although everything in Japan has aspects that are inefficient due to institutional "culture."
Just as an anecdote: I see a neurologist once every few months for migraines; He prescribes medicine I take daily; the visit costs about 4-5 dollars and the medicine for 3 months costs about 15-20$ total. I could change doctors if I wanted by just making an appointment somewhere else. We also are having our second baby in February and that's another thing I could describe but we can go to any hospital we want and it's relatively easy. As for premiums I'm not sure what they cost because my job deducts it and contributes but for my 3-person family I'm thinking it's maybe 2 or 3 hundred dollars a month. Something like that.
The only thing that worries me is I float between the two systems due to the nature of my contract. Knock on wood I can stay in the company system. I believe if I get kicked onto the independent worker system I wold see premiums double, perhaps. I don't like how the poorer you are the more you pay. That part leads me to think the European single-payer systems are better but, on the other hand, this system works pretty well and it's probably more palatable in the U.S. perhaps. You do pay for it individually.

drogulus


     The Swiss have private health insurance for everyone. Government spending is relatively low, instead costs are controlled. A variety of means are used to keep quality up.

     The big difference is there is no employer insurance. Insurance is individual and the penalty is high if you refuse to get it.

     Cross subsidy of rich and poor, healthy and sick is total, everyone is in, just as every health care expert insists is necessary.

     I see no need to prefer well run systems of one general type to another. Repubs oppose well run, not just a type. OCare should have been their chance to prevent care from being socialist, but it turned out that any system that was too good for too many was intolerable.
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Karl Henning

Quote from: drogulus on October 15, 2019, 04:48:28 AM
     The Swiss have private health insurance for everyone. Government spending is relatively low, instead costs are controlled. A variety of means are used to keep quality up.

     The big difference is there is no employer insurance. Insurance is individual and the penalty is high if you refuse to get it.

     Cross subsidy of rich and poor, healthy and sick is total, everyone is in, just as every health care expert insists is necessary.

     I see no need to prefer well run systems of one general type to another. Repubs oppose well run, not just a type. OCare should have been their chance to prevent care from being socialist, but it turned out that any system that was too good for too many was intolerable.

You just have to be rich, losers!
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot