On Thu, 12 Aug 2004 09:26:31 GMT, Gunner
wrote:
*snip*
Short term bonds? Dave...any idea of how many people simply cannot
come up with $825 a month, period? If its a toss up between rent and
food, or $825 in insurance..most will not take the well insured while
living in a refrigerator box route.

Gunner

Oh yea...I am far too aware of the difficult decisions that
too many folks have to make in today's America about what to spend
their dollars on. I was KIND of assuming that this was an "ideal"
case where folks had enough cash to pony up for that sort of
outrageous monthly premium (and this IS one case where the word
"premium" is absolutely accurate!).
Perhaps the question should be "why ARE rates this high".
I suspect it is a number of factors working together, including
the fact that most insurance companies are FOR PROFIT (which by
definition means their focus is more on making money for their
investors than helping people through hard times), the increasing
and automatic use of insurance to pay for EVERYTHING (not just, as
other folks have pointed out, catastrophic costs), and the
overwhelming upwards spiral of health costs in the USA (caused
by, among other things, Health Care becoming a FOR PROFIT enterprise,
the failure of the AMA to weed out the bad doctors, the spiraling
costs of malpractice insurance because of the previous point, and
the amazing costs of developing new technology).
Part of the problem too, seems to be the decades of training
that Americans have had that the way to fix a problem is to pop
a pill. That has ended up with way too many folks being over-
medicated, and, way too many folks ready to run to the emergency
room for the smallest cut. While there are many good reasons
to go to the Emergency Room, it can go overboard...and thanks
to the fact that is is impossible for many folks to afford
insurance, the ER is their only choice..
There is no painless way to fix the problem. We could
implement a national health care system (as Canada/the UK). However,
that has its own problems. That sort of solution will guarentee
that at least a few folks will have their moms die from lack of
treatment for what COULD have been a fairly treatable problem.
The Health care and insurance industries could go back
to being pure non-profit organizations. That is REALLY not likely
to happen, because there are too many folks making too much money
off the industry now.
We could limit malpractice awards and how or when a doctor
could be sued. That would go over like a log in the punchbowl,
though, both because of the huge number of lawyers who have a
really comfortable life because of the money that they make off
of malpractice suits, and, the anger that folks have over poor
care. It might work a bit better if there were some way of
actually weeding out the doctors that were incompetent. Right
now...we still have no way to do this, or to even find out
what a doctor's record IS.
However, until a majority of Americans decide they REALLY
want to do something about it, we may as well bite the bullet and
live with it, because the situation will not change.
Kind of like one of my clients. They have a powered gate
that currently has to be pulled open and closed manually, because
it needs to be repaired and refurbished. Since management gets
there after the gate is opened, and is almost NEVER the last one
to leave, there is no pressure, interest or inclination to get
the gate fixed so we can go back to pushbutton opening and closing.
Just some rambling thoughts.
Regards
Dave Mundt