The numbers don't add up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704548604575097602436388116.html

The Wall Street Journal, 4 March 2010.

Joe Gwinn


PS: If the URL doesn't work, ensure that you got the whole thing.

"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
The numbers don't add up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704548604575097602436388116.html

The Wall Street Journal, 4 March 2010.

Joe Gwinn


PS: If the URL doesn't work, ensure that you got the whole thing.

Are these more b.s., Joe, like the piece on Chile you linked to yesterday?
Did you check the facts, or do you swallow this stuff whole?

--
Ed Huntress

In article ,
"Ed Huntress" wrote:

"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
The numbers don't add up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...602436388116.h
tml

The Wall Street Journal, 4 March 2010.

Joe Gwinn


PS: If the URL doesn't work, ensure that you got the whole thing.

Are these more b.s., Joe, like the piece on Chile you linked to yesterday?
Did you check the facts, or do you swallow this stuff whole?

Ad hominem.

Joe Gwinn

"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"Ed Huntress" wrote:

"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
The numbers don't add up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...602436388116.h
tml

The Wall Street Journal, 4 March 2010.

Joe Gwinn


PS: If the URL doesn't work, ensure that you got the whole thing.

Are these more b.s., Joe, like the piece on Chile you linked to
yesterday?
Did you check the facts, or do you swallow this stuff whole?

Ad hominem.

Huh? I'm talking about the failure of *facts*, not of any person. The facts
in your link regarding Chile don't stand scrutiny. Over 25 years ago, riding
to my editing job, on my regular train to NYC with a WSJ editorialist whose
name I won't mention, I told him that if they would pay me a decent rate to
fact-check their editorials, I could make a living out of correcting their
mistakes. He did not disagree.

--
Ed Huntress

Ed,
I think he took it in like a "Big Gulp".

Bob Swinney
"Ed Huntress" wrote in message ...

"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
The numbers don't add up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704548604575097602436388116.html

The Wall Street Journal, 4 March 2010.

Joe Gwinn


PS: If the URL doesn't work, ensure that you got the whole thing.

Are these more b.s., Joe, like the piece on Chile you linked to yesterday?
Did you check the facts, or do you swallow this stuff whole?

--
Ed Huntress

"Robert Swinney" wrote in message
...
Ed,
I think he took it in like a "Big Gulp".

Bob Swinney

I think some of these guys need to vary their diet. Too much of the WSJ
editorials can give you constipation. d8-)

--
Ed Huntress


"Ed Huntress" wrote in message
...

"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
The numbers don't add up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704548604575097602436388116.html

The Wall Street Journal, 4 March 2010.

Joe Gwinn


PS: If the URL doesn't work, ensure that you got the whole thing.

Are these more b.s., Joe, like the piece on Chile you linked to yesterday?
Did you check the facts, or do you swallow this stuff whole?

--
Ed Huntress

On Thu, 4 Mar 2010 09:41:53 -0500, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:


"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"Ed Huntress" wrote:

"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
The numbers don't add up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...602436388116.h
tml

The Wall Street Journal, 4 March 2010.

Joe Gwinn


PS: If the URL doesn't work, ensure that you got the whole thing.

Are these more b.s., Joe, like the piece on Chile you linked to
yesterday?
Did you check the facts, or do you swallow this stuff whole?

Ad hominem.

Huh? I'm talking about the failure of *facts*, not of any person. The facts
in your link regarding Chile don't stand scrutiny. Over 25 years ago, riding
to my editing job, on my regular train to NYC with a WSJ editorialist whose
name I won't mention, I told him that if they would pay me a decent rate to
fact-check their editorials, I could make a living out of correcting their
mistakes. He did not disagree.
================
A few of the many problems in attempting any kind of health
coverage cost:benefit analysis is defining exactly what and how
many people are covered, what they are covered for, and how the
"costs" are calculated, i.e. "out of pocket," "total societal,"
and many more.

A major complicating factor is the huge amount of "cost
externalization" through tax shifting that occurs with the
current system because of the non taxability of medical benefits
to the employee and deductibility as a business expense for the
employer.

This results in the current situation where the people without
formal employer provided health care benefits, both employers and
employees, are paying higher taxes to subsidize the people who
get employer provided health benefits. This problem is amplified
by the fact that people without health insurance tend to be
concentrated in the lowest economic strata, while the better the
health care benefits, the better the economic status of both the
employer and employee, thus the current system is highly
regressive.

Much of the current costs of non-insured medical care is hidden
in municipal hospital deficits, higher fees and payments for
covered/paying patients, and state social safety net costs. Over
time these very high costs are amplified by the emphasis on
emergency treatments rather than the *MUCH* cheaper prevention,
e.g. childhood immunizations and adequate prenatal care.

Thus it is entirely possible to get wildly varying cost estimates
through the inclusion or exclusion of various revenue and cost
line items. Most unfortunately much of this debate is driven by
ideology and the way things should be, rather than facts and the
way things are.

While I am not wildly excited by any of this, particularly the
expansion of government, it appears that the following are
required if we are to successfully revise the current
unsustainable and nonfunctional system. Serious questions remain
if the current proposed health coverage plan is the solution to a
problem or simply a new problem.

(1) The national health care plan must cover every person within
the U.S., legal and illegal alike. They are covered now, but
this forces the costs to the surface and eliminates the hidden
costs for un reimbursed medical care currently borne by the
municipal hospitals, paying customers, and state/local social
service agencies [i.e. the local taxpayers].

(2) A document detailing coverage under national health care must
be developed ASAP, explicitly detailing conditions covered,
conditions not covered, and all exclusions and limitations.

Until (1) and (2) are accomplished, the costs of national health
care can only be [very] roughly estimated.

(3) Employer provided health insurance "cost externalization" and
tax shifting must be ended ASAP. These benefits should be taxed
at the same rate as any other employee income/benefit, e.g.
personal use of a company car, and most likely a cap should be
established for the amount deductible as an employer business
expense for each employee. This health insurance tax
exemption/business expense has severely distorted employment
costs and business economics.


Unka George (George McDuffee)
...............................
The past is a foreign country;
they do things differently there.
L. P. Hartley (1895-1972), British author.
The Go-Between, Prologue (1953).

"F. George McDuffee" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 4 Mar 2010 09:41:53 -0500, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:


"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"Ed Huntress" wrote:

"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
The numbers don't add up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...602436388116.h
tml

The Wall Street Journal, 4 March 2010.

Joe Gwinn


PS: If the URL doesn't work, ensure that you got the whole thing.

Are these more b.s., Joe, like the piece on Chile you linked to
yesterday?
Did you check the facts, or do you swallow this stuff whole?

Ad hominem.

Huh? I'm talking about the failure of *facts*, not of any person. The
facts
in your link regarding Chile don't stand scrutiny. Over 25 years ago,
riding
to my editing job, on my regular train to NYC with a WSJ editorialist
whose
name I won't mention, I told him that if they would pay me a decent rate
to
fact-check their editorials, I could make a living out of correcting their
mistakes. He did not disagree.
================
A few of the many problems in attempting any kind of health
coverage cost:benefit analysis is defining exactly what and how
many people are covered, what they are covered for, and how the
"costs" are calculated, i.e. "out of pocket," "total societal,"
and many more.

snip


Thus it is entirely possible to get wildly varying cost estimates
through the inclusion or exclusion of various revenue and cost
line items. Most unfortunately much of this debate is driven by
ideology and the way things should be, rather than facts and the
way things are.

more snip -- but I read the whole thing, honest

Right. It's great material for ideological editorials, isn't it? I've tried
to hack through a few of them but I've concluded that it isn't even worth
reading them.

--
Ed Huntress

On Thu, 04 Mar 2010 09:36:18 -0500, the infamous Joseph Gwinn
scrawled the following:

In article ,
"Ed Huntress" wrote:

"Joseph Gwinn" wrote in message
...
The numbers don't add up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...602436388116.h
tml

The Wall Street Journal, 4 March 2010.

Joe Gwinn


PS: If the URL doesn't work, ensure that you got the whole thing.

Are these more b.s., Joe, like the piece on Chile you linked to yesterday?
Did you check the facts, or do you swallow this stuff whole?

Ad hominem.

Poor Ed drank the Obama bin Biden koolaid last year. shrug

--
An author spends months writing a book, and maybe puts his
heart's blood into it, and then it lies about unread till
the reader has nothing else in the world to do.
-- W. Somerset Maugham, The Razor's Edge, 1943