health insurance -- why is a PRIVATE bureaucracy better than a PUBLIC bureaucracy?

[unblock]

if your medical treatment is being delayed or denied, what difference does it make if the bureaucracy that's delaying or denying it is public or private?

reminds me of that scene from that guilty pleasure, "my cousin vinny": "imagine you're a deer. you're prancing along. you get thirsty. you spot a little brook. you put your little deer lips down to the cool, clear water - BAM. a fuckin' bullet rips off part of your head. your brains are lying on the ground in little bloody pieces. now i ask ya, would you give a fuck what kind of pants the son-of-a-bitch who shot you was wearing?"


as it's structured now, private insurance companies have a PROFIT MOTIVE to DELAY OR DENY your services. the usual argument about private business being more efficient WORKS AGAINST THE PATIENT in this case because claims are LOSSES for the insurance companies. normally, a private company has an incentive to provide good service to get your repeat business and good word of mouth. but that doesn't work with private health insurance for several reasons.

for one thing, the typical patient isn't the purchasing decision-maker, his employer is. for another thing, you don't buy "more" insurance if you're particularly happy, nor do you cancel if you're particularly unhappy. best you can do is switch plans. in some cases.

it's amazing that people can stop their "analysis" at the mindless "private is better than public" without looking at the reasons why private is supposed to be better and seeing if they actually apply to the case at hand.

in this case, they don't.

[snot]

1. yup.

e.g., http://c-cyte.blogspot.com/2009/08/healthcare-reform.html

[drm604]

2. The difference is

the private bureaucracy's goal is to make a profit, while the public bureaucracy's goal is to deliver patient care. It's that simple.

[ejpoeta]

3. i totally agree. if you are lucky you can change plans... if your employer offers

a choice. like with bob's company.... you can choose independent health or cigna. we had independent health, which we didn't ahve problems with, but had to switch to the cigna because the cost of independent health went up $100/mo. if bob had at least gotten a raise to offset the increase, we would have kept it. instead we ended up signing the kids up for child health plus (thankfully our income was low enough that we didn't ahve to have them uninsured for six months) and put ourselves on the higher deductible cigna plan. SOOO... now we are paying for our own insurance, and paying $9/mo for each kid and the state is subsidizing blue cross/blue shield to cover the girls... So who is making out on that deal???

I don't really understand this idea that somehow a private company with a monetary motive to deny claims is somehow better to handle healthcare needs than a government bureaucrat that isn't going to get any incentive to deny a person. But as it is, considering other countries.... from what i understand, the DOCTOR is the one who decides what needs to be done, not any government bureaucrat... so this point is manufactured. And I just wish instead of watching faux news and their 'canadians' who hate their insurance.... they would actually talk to real canadians and people from other countries to find out for themselves. They hate their system so bad that no government official would even dare try to take it away. yeah, sounds quite awful!! Medicare is so awful that's why no politician who wants to have any future would dare try to mess with it. because it's so horrible.

[donco6]

6. Our choice is Kaiser and Kaiser. n/t

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

4. The private bureaucracy is better ...

Because it will stuff the pockets of members of congress with wads of cash.

A public bureaucracy won't do that.

:hi:

[unblock]

9. ding! ding! ding! ding! ding!

[KharmaTrain]

5. Eyes Wide Shut...

Fortunately many people have never had a direct experience with the medical system...especially those in their 30s. They grown up in Raygunomics and the unregulated world. It's the only one they know and can't relate to medicare or even the VA (few are real veterans) and thus easily bamboozled by the talking points. Then there are the elderly who have been targeted with the whisper campaign via hate radio and "beauty shop chatter" of all sorts of misconceptions. Some are outright selfish...seeing the expansion of government health care taking away from their own needs.

Insurance companies once had a role of community risk. The money we paid in premiums went to the few times that we claimed or for the others who did. There had been abuse that led the insurance companies to deny and once that slippery slope began (back in the 80s), they just added more exclusions on both patients and doctors. It was a subtle change and one that many under 50 have no clue about as this system has been so predominate for so long.

There's so much misinformation out there right now...it's a bold attempt to avoid discussing what you bring up. Private insurance has co-opted the entire medical system and the "fear" of a public program is echoed so much that the corporate media assumes this is public opinion. It's an assumption spread by lots of ads for insurance companies and special interests.

There's a place for public and private. I honestly don't trust any one single gatekeeper and competition is a good thing. There will be a need for supplemental insurance or those who want their own "cadillac" plans. So be it. But there needs to be a massive revision of a system now built on sickness and profit to one of prevention and efficiency.

[PA Democrat]

7. I have asking that question more and more as of late.

People have one example after another of the lows to which corporations will sink in order to make a profit. They see example after example of the ills of unregulated capitalism: the mortgage meltdown, Enron, Blackwater, KBR, Bernie Madoff, WorldCom, Tyco, Adelphia, etc. Even when they ARE regulated the companies still do whatever they please because they have the money to game the system.

And then they trust the must important thing of all- their health, their very lives to corporations who have been proven to be less than ethical in their dealings with their subscribers.

It makes no sense.

[Vinca]

8. Public, private - it makes no difference. The only difference

is in the campaign coffers of politicians. If we have government health care, the checks will stop.

[customerserviceguy]

10. I might have figured out why some people feel there is a difference

What happens today when a corporate outrage gets bad enough? First the fringe media, then the mainstream media cover the story, Congresspeople get involved, etc. The government and the media become a court of final appeal for the excesses of corporate bureaucracy. There is at least a chance that the big corporation can be either shamed into doing the right thing, or replaced by another market choice that explicitly says, "We're not going to do that."

What if the government is the one doing the denying of care? Who do you appeal to then? Your Congressman may have already voted either for or against the situation, but he's not going to make any re-election headlines by bashing his own government, the way he would for bashing a private company.

It's not my reasoning, but I was listening to some call in shows on the radio, and I heard something like that enunciated by a caller. It did make me think.

[unblock]

11. that's actually rather silly. it's far easier for the government to rein in a government program

than it is for them to rein in private corporate behavior.

[customerserviceguy]

15. But there's the difference

We trust the government to police itself, and the wingnut mindset does not. That is where the difference lies.

[Orsino]

12. For-profit bureaucracy is inferior...

...particularly when outside shareholders start demanding Teh Suck.

[Overseas]

13. Shhh. You're not supposed to expose that truth.

You're not supposed to notice that --

Do you want GOVERNMENT/INSURANCE COMPANY bureaucrats running your healthcare?

You're also apparently not supposed to say--

Wait a second. Didn't you Medical Industrial Complex folks say the same scary stuff when you stomped out the Clintons' attempt to introduce national health insurance in the 90's--

and haven't you had over ten years to prove your case? Ten years in which all of the problems with the for-profit privatized healthcare system got worse and worse?

You're supposed to jump with the right wingers into the Obama Baaaad camp so you won't spend the time in the PRIVATIZED HEALTHCARE IS BROKEN area.

Very clever, those right wing PR firms. Let's make the whole discussion about people being angry and afraid, so we won't take the month of August reviewing what is wrong with the Privatized Medical Care for Profit system.

[newspeak]

14. there's also another reason

I once worked with Social Security--a public option is backed by the taxpayers and if you don't get service and complain, you may get attention--if you don't get attention after complaining you write your congresscritter and then you will get attention. Because every individual who wrote to their congresscritter was red flagged for special attention. Now, a corporation really doesn't give a damn, unless they screw enough people that they have to do a little something so they don't face too much bad PR. But even then, if they are arrogant enough, they still might not do anything, unless THE GOVERNMENT comes down on them.

Look at Blackwater--I said a couple of years ago that this company could hire any sadistic thugs around the world and probably get away with their actions. A corporation can get away with a lot more heinous things than a government that is still answerable to the public. Under *, they privatized functions that the military normally did and look what happened? They privatized part of the VA--I wonder how many vets know that? In the military, the soldiers have received tainted water and food, some have been electrocuted in the shower--and what did the corporations get, another contract? Blackwater may have used illegal weapons, murdered innocent civilians, and what does that do for our soldiers? Make their job harder? I'll take public over privatized any day.