MLM Directory - Why dont liberals want to give the free market a chance to fix health care?

Why dont liberals want to give the free market a chance to fix health care?

Why do liberals strike down ideas of removing regulations that prevent competition of cross state selling of insurance. This would surely spur a market for individual health care plans that are not tied to the employer. This would be a simple and easy thing to correct if it didnt work out why don't liberals ever give the market a chance?

Public Comments

uh 200 years isnt enough?
Removing regulation is what got us into this mess. The Free Market doesn't fix anything, it just redistributes wealth from the masses to the rich. The market had its chance, it failed.
The free market has failed.
It is very simple. They want to be taken care of. It is so much easier than making their own way.
because obama promised a hella lot of free stuff to a hella lot people in order to win the election so he has to hike taxes on working people in order to make it free for the other people it's complex
Remember the early 90's when HMO's were finally going to get healthcare costs under control?
The Free Market doesn't make it FREE - Liberals can't understand this concept. Liberals do not understand that Free-Loaders in the health care system make prices go up - Liberals call this a failure of the free market system - Liberals think that because the word "Free" is in free market that it should be free!!!! Big Gov Bankrupted Soc Sec - let's see how well they do with Gov Run Health Care - can't wait!!!!
So they don't have to leave their mothers basement, or her Health insurance, either. Besides, they can control things better than the free market, they took control of the housing market, and look how well that turned out! oh, wait. Crap.
Maybe because the free market is what's wrong with health care? Just a thought. Consider that several years ago, many free-market types were hoping to privatize social security. Then Wall Street collapsed and needed to be bailed out by public funds. Can you imagine what would've happened to people's saving if we'd listened to you guys? Hell, Ivy League MBA types lost their fortunes then, so what chance would an 89 year old widow in Iowa have had for surviving that crap? No thanks. Health care is too important for you to gamble our future on it.
Deregulation is what made health care costs go up and the quality of care go down. It also made it much more complicated. The free market had it's chance, it failed.
They feel that they deserve to control our lives.
because if something is wrong you have to change something. they never think to just let it alone and see if it gets better. my health insurance is going up 780 dollars this year for what i didn't go to the doctor once last year why do i have to pay more. i am currently paying after the raise in health insurance 1690 dollars a year which is a small price to pay a lot of people have it worse than me i know, but it is getting to the point where i am thinking about just not paying for health care insurance and if something happens they have to take care of me like alot of people are doing and that is why we are in this mess
If it was going to work it would have worked years ago.
Republicans controlled all branches of gov-- house, senate, wh, the judiciary-- from 2001 to 2006, yet made no single attempt to remove regulations. they didn't pursue this strategy either, so they're just as guilty, am i wrong?
Look, if the fact that Michelle Obama was a supervisor over a hospital and received a pay jump from $100,000 a year to $500,000 a year to supervise over minorities health care, and her first order of business was to change policy so all minorities without health care were transfered to other hospitals, which not only caused several deaths of patients during route, but also caused several hospitals in the vacinity to collapse, doesn't convince liberals Obama isn't looking out for their interests, nothing ever will. The fact that people are losing their houses and families are being torn apart because of the financial hardship liberal policies have and are causing, doesn't register with them. It is all good as long as non Americans receive healthcare. Us Americans have been robbing them of their resources for far to long. If a minority jumps you, beats you, and steals your wallet then you should just suck it up because they are underadvataged socially, and don't have the common sense to know what they are doing is wrong, and of coarse this is the white mans fault. Yes, that is the liberal mind at work. BTW, by 2014, when Obama care goes into effect, Medicare will be worthless for poverty stricken people. No dental, no vision, $5000 mandantory premium before any coverage kicks in on serious illness or injuries, co-pay on prescriptions and doctors visits, and buy what you can't afford plans. That is where it stands now. Obama isn't done cutting medicare yet. If you can't afford exceptible coverage now, you aren't going to be able to afford Obamas plan. It is a tax!
A 'free market' implies there are multiple competitive companies within an industry. In health care that is not the case. There are about 5 major insurance companies that write and under write almost all health insurance policies and that practice price fixing and almost complete market control. The health insurance industry is really a practice of monopolistic capitalism where free markets do not exist. To turn these companies loose, unregulated would be the very worse possible thing that could be done.
It would have the effect of invalidating state regulations on insurance companies for individual policies and businesses can already buy insurance for their employees across state lines. It is a phony proposal since it would not even get a majority vote amoug Republicans. Conservatives do not want their elected representives to cede what they see as their right to determine what happen in their state to the federal government
Insurers have to meet the requirements for selling insurance based on the state where they as a company are based, not where the purchaser of the insurer is located. Since insurers currently cannot sell across state lines it means that they must set up a subsidiary in the state where they want to sell, and must meet the requirements for an insurance company in that state. Allowing insurers to sell across state lines will encourage them to relocate to states that require them to provide the fewest benefits. Additionally, this would put the regulation of the insurers for the entire country in the hands of the state governments of the few states where the insurers would migrate to - governments elected solely by the residents of those few states. I would support selling across state lines IF there were a minimum standard of coverage that all insurers had to provide. But, allowing insurance to sell across state lines will decrease the cost of insurance for the healthy at the expense of increasing the cost of insurance of the sick. Lastly, the people who think that people who support the reforms must want to be given health coverage for free need to understand that there are people who want to buy their own health coverage, but that no insurer will sell them any. These people are not smokers, they exercise regularly and have not abused their bodies. But they have been diagnosed with some illness or condition that they did nothing to cause (like Epilepsy, Multiple Sclerosis, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Leukemia, Type 1 Diabetes, .......) These people want to buy and pay for their own health insurance, but they're viewed as having pre-existing conditions, and no insurer will sell them insurance.
Because they already know it would work. After all, literally 100% of systemic complaints about our system have been PREDICTED results of liberal policy interfering with markets.
oh, doing this would stop new york and similar states from requiring young and healthy people to subsidize the health insurance of older and sick people. a glance at rates for a health 28 year old man in NY and AZ makes this very clear -- the NY rates are over three times the AZ rates. meanwhile, a 58 year old with pre-existing conditions in AZ probably can't shift his medical care costs to anyone else [can't get coverage for the pre-existing condition] but in NY he can -- IF he can pay the monthly cost at all, of course, which is fairly difficult [the NY cost is near 1,000 a month, even after cross subsidy from health 28 year old subscribers.] in fact, NY has very few individual policies issued to healthy 28 year old consumers -- they tend to not buy insurance at all unless or until they're buying through an employer plan [which is much cheaper since 58 year olds with severe conditions generally aren't employed at all and thus aren't included in the subscriber pool].
We saw what free market health care did to the God-fearing Conservative people of rural America.......it abandoned them
It is too late for a free-market solution involving medical care. That opportunity went away more than 40 years ago. Now, medical care is held hostage by health insurance companies, regardless of where you live in the US. In order to get medical care now, you must buy health insurance, get it subsidized from your employer, or be incredibly rich, or fit into a privileged group of poor people who are eligible for Medicaid, Medicare, or be destitute. There are no other options. Insurance companies are now the gate-keepers of medical care. In economics, this situation is known as an "oligopoly". (few sellers, many buyers) The only way a free-market solution could be effective now would be to do away with all entities that sell health insurance.
They like the idea of being dependent on the state. The modern state has taken on the role of an apparently benign, generous omnipotent god-like parent, who serves as custodian, manager, provider and caretaker, all to the detriment of the people. We have, in effect, parentified our governments in the belief that we will be better off if they take care of us than if we take care of ourselves. We have shifted our assumptions about the human condition from an ethical and religious conception that we must earn a good life through individual and cooperative hard work and responsibility, to a secular and collectivist conception of life as a manipulative competition for the bounty of the state. Rather than praying to a higher power to strengthen and guide us in our personal labors to serve others as we serve ourselves, we plead to our legislators for a place at the public trough and hope that they will do unto us at least as generously as they do unto others. Big government revenue has become in effect the income of a very large family whose many children vie for indulgence, while ready at any moment to protest in the name of egalitarianism if one sibling seems to be getting more than another. Why should they have to take on the adult burden of responsibility, and make choices for themselves? MR
First off; striking down the idea of cross state selling of insurance was the conservatives doing. After all they want states rule. Secondly employer plans were started as an incentive to keep employees and were a bonus to the employees pay. today most employer plans are paid for by the employee as in deduction from their pay. Wake up our health care system is broke (in more ways than one).
The free Market shot us all the way up to 37th place in health care. Health care is the 3rd leading cause of death, thanks to Big Pharma, All due to free market.
The entire health care system is in private hands and rates are not competitive because insurance companies have monopolies in each state and they have no competition. They are exempt from anti-trust laws.That was the reason to have a government insurance option for qualifying people, to force private insurance rates down. Insurance companies themselves would probably prevent inter-state policies because they lose money if there is a flood of California residents buying Kentucky policies, and not only that, since California health costs are higher, the insurance company may not pay as much of the cost and the patient might end up paying more than 20%.
They already can sell across lines, the insurance companies don't want to be held to the standards set state by state, so they get around it by calling themselves discount or assurance plans. That way they can't be held to the stricter standards of calling themselves insurance and be subject to laws that make sure they provide what they say they will when you need them. I live in NY my discount plan comes from Texas. If I need help with it, I can't call my state insurance board like I did when I needed help with Aetna.
Free market has been demonstrated not to work and it is far to late for yet another experiment. Besides, what will happen is like what happens with incorporating - the state with the most lax regulations will attract all the business. So ultimately, under free market rules, the state the regulates the insurance industry the least is where most all the companies will locate and then sell across state lines, thereby giving LESS power to the local people to control their own destinies.
They want total control and care little about anything else. Peace
Selling insurance across state lines is absurd. If you knew anything about insurance regulation, it's controlled at the state level. Selling across state lines would be a regulatory nightmare and add to the expense. The whole health care bill uses private insurance companies to pay for health care costs. It is NOT GOVERNMENT TAKEOVER. The bill reforms insurance so they can't exclude people or be unfair. WHY DON'T CONSERVATIVES STOP AND THINK ABOUT THE IMPROVEMENTS LIBERALS BRING TO SOCIETY AND THE DESTRUCTIONS THAT THEY CAUSE TO SOCIETY.
That is your best example? Selling healthcare across state lines. All that would produce is a battle by the states to attract healthcare companies. We wind up with a race to the bottom amongst states and worse not better healthcare. Healthcare is a simple case of a market failure due to positive externalities being ignored (a Pareto inefficiency). Pretending the free market can fix that is simply ignorant.
Because the free market has not come through to offer the best health care it can, and millions of LEGAL Americans have gone uncovered. In fact, many health care companies cut back on the quality of their health care and pocket the money. That's why many Americans want to try universal health care. France is the #1 health care in the world, and theirs is universal. I've talked to people who have been to France and said the health care is definitely superior to the U.S. Currently, America ranks #37 in the world's health care. However, universal health care is a chance taker in itself. Unfortunately the only to know if it'll work for us is to give it a try.
The healthcare industry is a protected monopoly that is regulated by the states. There is no such thing as "free enterprise" " The McCarran-Ferguson Act of 1945 (15 U.S.C.A. § 1011 et seq.) gives states the authority to regulate the "business of insurance" without interference from federal regulation, unless federal law specifically provides otherwise. The act provides that the "business of insurance, and every person engaged therein, shall be subject to the laws of the several States which relate to the regulation or taxation of such business." Congress passed the McCarran-Ferguson Act primarily in response to the Supreme Court case of United States v. South-Eastern Underwriters Ass'n, 322 U.S. 533, 64 S. Ct. 1162, 88 L. Ed. 1440 (1944). Before the South-Eastern Under-writers case, the issuing of an insurance policy was not thought to be a transaction in commerce, which would subject the insurance industry to federal regulation under the COMMERCE CLAUSE. In South-Eastern Underwriters, the Court held that an insurance company that conducted substantial business across state lines was engaged in interstate commerce and thus was subject to federal antitrust regulations. Within a year of South-Eastern Underwriters, Congress enacted the McCarran-Ferguson Act in response to states' concerns that they no longer had broad authority to regulate the insurance industry in their boundaries. The McCarran-Ferguson Act provides that state law shall govern the regulation of insurance and that no act of Congress shall invalidate any state law unless the federal law specifically relates to insurance. The act thus mandates that a federal law that does not specifically regulate the business of insurance will not PREEMPT a state law enacted for that purpose. A state law has the purpose of regulating the insurance industry if it has the "end, intention or aim of adjusting, managing, or controlling the business of insurance" (U.S. Dept. of Treasury v. Fabe, 508 U.S. 491, 113 S. Ct. 2202, 124 L. Ed. 2d 449 [1993]). Read more: McCarran-Ferguson Act of (1945) - Insurance, Business, Federal, Law, Industry, and Provides http://law.jrank.org/pages/8497/McCarran-Ferguson-Act-1945.html#ixzz11XIR78WF"
Liberals don't trust the free market. It's been around too long. Nothing that old can be good. Liberals want fresh, new ideas, like socialism.