<p>“emilybee - Can you please tell the largest employer what you think.”</p>
<p>I will get right on it.</p>
<p>
Agreed. I couldn’t even begin to count the hours that I have spent over the past 10 years talking to my kids about health insurance – always at their initiation.</p>
<p>My daughter had a lot of angst last year over the prospect of being without insurance for 3 weeks when she changed jobs – fortunately we figured out that she could elect COBRA retroactively if she got injured or sick in that period.</p>
<p>The state money may subsidize a UCSF medical students education at around $15,000 per year. (That’s the approx. difference between the UCSF tuition and a private medical school tuition. Obviously some are more, some like Baylor are less). </p>
<p>Since the revenue from the state is 5 times the tuition revenue, if all that state money went to medical student education, then private schools would be charging 5 times what a state school charges to make up for not getting any state money. So they would be charging $175,000 per year. They are not there yet*.</p>
<p>Although Baylor has a private school tag, Baylor is subsidized by Texas to a large extent which is the reason they have over 75% residents.</p>
<p>“Within that context, UCSF receives less than 5 percent of our total budget from the state, which covers only one-third of what we spend on education. And those costs are rising rapidly. Providing a top-quality education in health science professions requires far greater resources than educating liberal arts or law students.”</p>
<p>[State</a> of the University 2013 Transcript | ucsf.edu](<a href=“http://www.ucsf.edu/news/2013/09/109111/state-university-2013-transcript]State”>State of the University 2013 Transcript | UC San Francisco)</p>
<p>I am not even going into judgements about “unnecessary or overly expensive”. My point is that many conditions are coming with increasing prices. The incidence of stroke hasnt increased much, but the years of survival, and cost, past an initial stroke has gone dramatically. </p>
<p>Alzheimer incidence hasnt changed much but it is now one of the most costly health conditions in the US health budget. And that isnt just as factor of an aging population.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I think the changes in income distribution is one of the problems. Now most of the wealth in this country is concentrated at the very top, and wages have been stagnant for years. So you have an expensive commodity (health care) and a market that is influenced by what upper income consumers can pay – but that is very much out of range from what average wage earners can hope to pay. See <a href=“http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1077681/thumbs/o-INCOME-DISTRIBUTION-900.jpg[/url]”>http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1077681/thumbs/o-INCOME-DISTRIBUTION-900.jpg</a> and <a href=“http://anticap.files.■■■■■■■■■■■■■/2010/04/inequality-p25_averagehouseholdincom.png[/url]”>http://anticap.files.■■■■■■■■■■■■■/2010/04/inequality-p25_averagehouseholdincom.png</a></p>
![http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1077681/thumbs/o-INCOME-DISTRIBUTION-900.jpg[/url]](http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1077681/thumbs/o-INCOME-DISTRIBUTION-900.jpg%5B/url%5D){kind=link}
![http://anticap.files.■■■■■■■■■■■■■/2010/04/inequality-p25_averagehouseholdincom.png[/url]](http://anticap.files.wordpress.com/2010/04/inequality-p25_averagehouseholdincom.png%5B/url%5D){kind=link}
<p>(I think this also might be a factor that drives college tuition as well. Essentially these are limited commodities that wealthy people want and are willing to pay for, at any cost, and so I think that drives up price all around).</p>
<p>Yep. Which is why this entire thing should be paid in capital gains taxes. Tax this and the desire to pay the working class better will return.</p>
<p>ETA. I would pay much higher taxes if this were done. But this " insurance fix" isn’t about getting everybody healthcare.</p>
<p>Or people will stop investing in things. Which makes society much worse off. </p>
<p>Calmom’s explanation isnt plausible. 1% (or 5%) of the people in the country cant be taking up most of the doctors appointments. </p>
<p>And if you go to places where millionaires arent a dime a dozen, you still have medical inflation.</p>
<p>Poetgrl, I agree with you on the tax question. My personal preference would have been a combination of basic level single payer coupled with tax increase – by “basic level” I mean that I think the ideal system is kind of no-frills at the public level, with the private market free to sell supplemental insurance. But I don’t make the laws. (If I did, I’d change a few more while I was at it.)</p>
<p>Yes, exactly!</p>
<p>Like public education and private education. </p>
<p>And, in some areas, there would be really great public health care and it would drive up the real estate market, and people would pay that extra to live there.</p>
<p>In other places, private would make sense as the way to go.</p>
<p>But, no matter where you went, or moved, or if the circumstances in your life changed or you had kids young, or whatnot? You could know you were covered.</p>
<p>Don’t you think the insurance industry would have a hard time with that plan?</p>
<p>Poetgrl, do you want to include illegal immigrants in your health care plan?</p>
<p>Yes, I do. I want people to have health care the way I want them to have education and clean water.</p>
<p>Ok…</p>
<p>
Would you prefer to pay by cash or by check?</p>
<p>So I heard there was legislation introduced by Senator Ron Johnson to allow anyone who got a cancellation notice to keep their current plan, even if it was not grandfathered. The legislation is meant to carry out the promise of this administration that if you like your plan, you can keep it. Will be interesting to see how many senators support it.</p>
<p>I’m going to pay the taxes for this, with the exception of the medical device tax, anyway.</p>
<p>I own a lot of real estate, and I will be paying the tax on that, and I will pay the 3% raise in my capital gains tax. I am already in the 1% and pay plenty of the subsidies, and my insurance rate has now tripled.</p>
<p>What I want is for those dollars to go to subsidize health care. Not health insurance, but health care.</p>
<p>Uhm, I just heard on the radio that the deadline has been extended.</p>
<p>So, maybe my cancellation letter will also be delayed. Here’s hoping!</p>
<p>“Calmom’s explanation isnt plausible. 1% (or 5%) of the people in the country cant be taking up most of the doctors appointments.”</p>
<p>Ah, those greedy one percenters! First they take most of the money in the country for themselves, and now they take most of the doctors appointments. The fine life they must lead, spending all day going from one medical appointment to another. Such fun.</p>
<p>Forget the fact that the vast majority of them have health insurance that actually pays for their procedures, instead of making the taxpayers and other patients pay (assumption, no data), and that many wealthier people pay additional costs to keep themselves healthy…and that the wealthy are far more likely to be fitter and healthier (fact). They are just so greedy, driving prices up for everyone.</p>