Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Da Geezer]

You want to reduce premiums? Nationalize the pharm industry and make insurance companies non-profit organizations.

Its time to treat prescription drugs like cigs - ban their advertising from television. If they can afford billions to saturate television, then they can afford to remove personal bankruptcy as a side effect of their products. I'd also reduce drug patents to 2 years to encourage generics.

Yup. A true Libertarian! Nationalize everything.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Right after I made my initial post on DJT's EO allowing insurance companies to write low cost, non-conforming policies, it was announced that he was ending all CRS subsidies. These pay insurance companies subsidies to offer low premiums to certain income groups.

If the ACA wasn't dead yesterday, it is today.

How I feel about this will depend on what Congress comes up with after Insurance premiums become unaffordable.

Jon provides a simple idea that, while I think it's a little radical, is the kind of thinking - outside the box - that's out there. While the health care industry collectively has a lot of good ideas, there is too much self interest to forge a comprehensive plan.

I don't think that leaving the industry alone hoping they will figure things out will work. I'm also, at this point, uncertain how much I want the Feds involved. At the least, there has to be uniform regulation or we'll have a confusing patchwork of health care programs in 51 states that, I feel, isn't appropriate.

[THE_WIZARD_]

[Da Geezer]

good post WIZ.....no, not that one, the one from Newsweek.

[crashcourse]

people trust their doctors too much and accept their recommendations at great cost to themselves and secondary payers

people want to live forever and often go through great deals of misery to try to make that happen without affecting anything but there own pocketbook

medicine is big business. all those specialists who have huge houses and boats and those big buildings the insurance companies have have to be paid by somebody. skip right to the most expensive procedure to cure your ills if you andur secondary payer can affford it

you have to simplify diagnostics--screw the exorbitant amounts of imaging and labs and specialists. Screw spending money on the whole buttload of people out there that I or most providers could look at and say you don't have a chance dude. When they have some terminal illmness or lifestyle that they refuse to change the government should not be responsible for keeping them going

until that's done medicare and Medicaid and your pocket book wuill continue to spend money like its going out of style. insurance companies don't have to worry they will get theres

[hack]

Yup. A true Libertarian! Nationalize everything.

LOL. Well done; Jon deserves that. He's right though. Adam Smith recognized that not everything should be left up to the invisible hand. His truest disciples, Americans, ignore that in order to commercialize more and more of life, creating genuine conflicts of interest and pushing more economic activity into the realm of non-real, rent-seeking, financially engineered, artificially costly bullshit. It's crowding out real, genuine marketplace activity. Time to put some things back in the hands of the public sector and force the private sector to do things Ayn Rand would have approved of.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Reality check .......... (BTW, aren't you in the medical field Crash? - if so, shame on you. You should know all about this.

people trust their doctors too much and accept their recommendations at great cost to themselves and secondary payers

CMS originates ICD10 diagnostic codes for Medicare. Commercial insurance companies are almost 100% utilizing these. Providers can not bill for anything without using them. CMS also sets regional rates of reimbursement for Medicare and Medicaid patients for a particular visit, procedure, diagnostic test or lab. Once again, nearly 100% of commercial insurers will pay according to these reimbursement rates. Some pay more than the Medicare/Medicaid rates but not much more.

Before a practice submits to an insurance company for reimbursement there is an in house, rigorous process to make sure the visit or procedure that is being billed for is justified by the provider's medical note. This process is done by folks who have 4y degrees in coding; if a practice submits a claim that is not backed up by the note - as determined by Medicare/Medicaid's or the insurer's audit process, it won't get paid. If it's found to be a fraudulent submission, fines are substantial. Documentation is a necessary pain in the ass.

As I've posted before, CMS has tremendous potential to control costs in innovative ways. That's another discussion.

people want to live forever and often go through great deals of misery to try to make that happen without affecting anything but there own pocketbook

You're talking about rationed care and death boards here. While there are arguments that this is an essential component of a sustainable HC delivery system, it is not politically viable in the US.

medicine is big business. all those specialists who have huge houses and boats and those big buildings the insurance companies have have to be paid by somebody. skip right to the most expensive procedure to cure your ills if you andur secondary payer can affford it

This is a superficial and vapid argument, Crash. Popular among Trumpsters without a whole lot of basis in facts. I'll concede there are folks that are making a shit ton of money in the current HC delivery system but it's not the providers.

.........When they have some terminal illmness or lifestyle that they refuse to change the government should not be responsible for keeping them going

Well, I think there are going to be some folks with hereditary Chronic Kidney Disease, for example, who need to have dialysis a few times a week to live that would disagree with you. There are 100s of examples where there are illnesses that folks have that they did nothing to acquire them. They're just going to die without some level of life sustaining measures. In a civilized society, doing this is a cost that has to be born.

[CGVT]

It's time.

[Dr. Strangelove]

]

congressional budget office

I realize the report is from the CBO, but that's not where you found the link to the January 2015 Daily Mail story.

And btw you believe CBO reports now? Up until this point Trump and Republicans have been saying the CBO doesn't know what the fuck its talking about.

[The Oracle]

They themselves don't know what the fuck they're talking about.

[hack]

They know what they're talking about. They just don't have any reason to believe they either will be called on their own bullshit, or that there will be a price to pay if they were.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Trump believes he can purposefully tank the Obamacare markets and blame the minority party when people can't afford coverage. Will it work?

To borrow phrases from the great man himself: "we'll see" and "you'll find out"

[Dr. Strangelove]

Trump kinda launched two major policy changes yesterday. You'd might expect he'd want to use his weekly address to explain them, describe why what he's doing is right, etc.

Nope.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/10/13/president-donald-j-trumps-weekly-address

[Da Geezer]

Incorrect. They do not pay tax twice on the same income in any country with which there is a double-taxation treaty. Here's a list of countries with which the US has signed
a double-taxation treaty. Ireland's on it. https://www.irs.gov/businesses/inter...reaties-a-to-z. Like I said, there are areas of this in which you know your shit and I don't, and areas in which I know my shit and you don't.

The treaties concern individuals. As I said, individuals do not face double taxation, but, above the $ 100,000 exemption, corporations do.

I think any sane person can spot the difference between a homo sapien and a legal entity that is something other than a carbon-based lifeform.

Well, then, you must consider the Supreme Court to be something other than a sane person.

But, going back to post #25676, you make several statements that are simply false on their face, or cannot be proven. A degree in Journalism does not grant you the right to say things that are just not true, even though your colleagues in DC may agree with you.

They are not discouraging investment now.

There is no other jurisdiction to which US firms can move and get a better deal

corporate taxes could go up and no corporations would suffer save for the ones that should probably be exposed to creative destruction.

No other government offers the same support capacities combined with the same willingness to be bought through campaign contributions.

While I admire your ode to American exceptionalism, I suggest you preface such statements with an "IMO". These statements are simply false.

[hack]

Well I wouldn't attribute all of that to American exceptionalism. Exceptionalism certainly was a powerful catalyst on the way up, no doubt about it. But now this is the best corporate environment in the world in large part because people can be convinced to vote against their own interests, and in favor of those of corporations.

Anyhow, no reason for me to continue with this if you continue to insult me without even making sure you have your facts straight. Google "Can multinationals use double-taxation treaties", or click here to go straight to the results. Any link on the page will tell you that double-taxation treaties cover more than just individuals.