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- #21
The problem is that the uninsured individual never pays his/her medical bills. They file for bankruptcy and the hospital writes off the loss. It happens all the time. I think it should be simple. If people don't want to purchase health insurance, then let them opt out with the stipulation that they must have the means to pay in order to receive treatment.
This would satisfy those who believe they shouldn't be forced to buy something they don't want, and it would protect those who do pay from also having to subsidize those who choose not to.
No, it still means you have to forced to buy something you don't want, a policy, a bond, or show some means you will let someone else put a claim on.
People without insurance get health care. It's not perfect, but it doesn't warrant massive disruption of a health insurance system that works fine for 85% of Americans for a handful of outliers.
It doesn't work fine for 85% of Americans, unless you believe that a total cost of over $650,000 per person over their lifetime is working fine. The cost is killing businesses in the US and making it much more difficult to compete with companies in countries throughout the world where they don't have this expense.
If we told every person 18 and over that they need to start making payments on their $650,000 medical bill immediately, you would see how well our system is working. Medical costs are hidden from most Americans because very few pay them directly. They are spread through insurance that is paid by employers and taxes paid to the government. If every American had to be responsible for their own healthcare, you would see drastic changes, because the cost is beyond absurd.
You see we are not that far apart then, the high cost of insurance and the high cost of care itself are a big factor in why healthcare is unaffordable for many in this nation. In fact the complete lack of competition in the health insurace industry sets up a system that allows for these high costs. If you as an individual can purchase a sofa from China then you should be allowed to purchase health insurance from anywhere other than the state you iive in. The fact is that costs were not addressed in this bill and will remain high, nor was the overall quality of care. Do those that support the current model seriously think all those that will be on state medicaid are now somehow better off than they were before, when medicaid is perhaps in terms of quality and acceptence the worst form of health insurnce you can have? The fact is that most Americans desire the cost of healthcare insurance to go down and the converage to remain the same or rise. In this new healthcare bill that is far from the case, so the only thing that has been accomplshed here is adding more people to an already over tasked system of state health insurance that suffers from poor quality care, and lack of providers. I will say that the addition of those with pre-existing condition is a good thing and could have been easily accomplished without the addtion of 2 Trillion dollars in addtional debt with no results other than to drive down the quality of care in this nation.