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OT: American Politics

drugs, machines, techniques and technologies aren't usually invented in administering health care to people at hospitals and doctors offices.

besides, there already is government regulation in the labs where those things are usually invented and tested (i.e. pharma's and univerisites).

it's a ridiculous spin tot hink that public health care chokes off innovation in the health industry.

innovation is a profit-motivated endeavour. provisioning health care isn't or at least shouldn't be.
 
Administrative costs were estimated at 157 Billion in 2007, and at the time, were projected to rise to 315 Billion by 2018. No idea how the changes to the health care system would effect that.

That's 157 Billion of a total 657 Billion dollar health care budget, or just under 25%...going to nothing but administrative costs
 
koreaboy fits into the western anglo-saxon narrative when it comes to the economy. (neo-liberal approach) With globalization being a theme they argue that you can't be competitive in a global environment if you have a lot of debt (much of the debt stems from expensive social programs) The facts are though that continental europe is good proof that social capitalism works just fine. Regulation in places like Germany have in no way prevented them from having one of the best economies in the world. And their social programs are in no way preventing them from being competitive.
 
msun30 said:
it's a ridiculous spin tot hink that public health care chokes off innovation in the health industry.

innovation is a profit-motivated endeavour. provisioning health care isn't or at least shouldn't be.
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Sick Kids hospital (and just in case kb is this ignorant, is in Canada, which has health-care, is one of the WORLD'S LEADING HOSPITALS)...people from that States bring their kids there for goddsakes.
 
KB would simply make the argument that the technologies and techniques used there were developed in the US, for profit, health care system. He would do so without providing anything to back up the assertion, but it's exactly what he would do.

The 'profit motive' is only a useful motivator when there is profit to be found when undertaking a task. Which works under the assumption that anything worth doing, anything of value to society, has a positive, short term, and direct economic effect on the undertaker. We know this to simply not be the truth. Take the example I used earlier, with NASA's moon mission. Incredibly expensive endeavour that served absolutely no direct, short term economic purpose. However, the technologies developed as part of that program have filtered their way through dozens of industries and assisted in creating many Billions of dollars in innovation and economic activity. If NASA were a private entity and they patented all of those inventions/techologies, they simply wouldn't have been able to pursue all of them to the point of being market ready technologies, many of them would have ended up shelved and forgotten.

Market fundamentalism is right in stating that it's not a governments job to determine winners and losers...in the marketplace, but it absolutely is a governments perogative to determine what technologies are in the best interests of that governments long term strategies for the nation, and to invest R&D dollars accordingly. If these investments create short term market innefficiencies...so be it.
 
Since Canada's economy is mostly a staples-economy, the govt. taking the lead role and protecting industries is absolutley crucial. If they didn't do this we would be f'ed. Nothing would be Canadian.
 
Bleedsblue&white said:
Remember hockeylover, we're talking about a country where a party for the rich has managed to convince at least some poor people that health-care is bad for them.
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Yes because Democrats aren't a party for the rich. Obama just shit out a billion more dollars. Midas stool.

Both parties benefit the rich man, one's the left pocket and the other is the right pocket. It just changes which "rich" get greased this term.
 
The stigma behind regulation for some people is that there have been many failures in regulation across the board in the past and it makes them leery. They of course do not look at the many successes in regulation as a counter-balance. There is no magic bullet, there will continue to be successes and failures. Not doing anything however is a sure fired failure.
 
True to an extent habsy, but I've told you before that I believe the Dems will have their bleeding hearts, but the Reps will not. Both parties are run by people with money, of course, but I think you have to admit it is the Republicans that don't want universal health-care, it's the Reps who are trying to cut taxes off the rich...so even though both parties have their problems, right now IMO, one is worse than the other.

If I knew nothing else, knowing that the Reps presidential candidate won't release his taxes is enough for me to smell the rat.
 
Habsy said:
That is so much a statement of lesser of two evils. I'm tired of the evil.
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I am afraid that is all we have. We have allowed a system where an honest man cannot succeed in politics, a system where policy can be bought. There was a time it could have been fixed relatively pain-free, but that time is long gone. I can't remember who said it first (though I usually take credit for it), but "a person can be smart...but people are stupid."
 
Leafovic said:
koreaboy fits into the western anglo-saxon narrative when it comes to the economy. (neo-liberal approach) With globalization being a theme they argue that you can't be competitive in a global environment if you have a lot of debt (much of the debt stems from expensive social programs) The facts are though that continental europe is good proof that social capitalism works just fine. Regulation in places like Germany have in no way prevented them from having one of the best economies in the world. And their social programs are in no way preventing them from being competitive.
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you happen to see the study recently that identified the top, most liveable cities in the world? i believe 7 out of the top 10 were in anglo-saxon countries.
 
i believe 7 out of the top 10 were in anglo-saxon countries.
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Yes, the two with the best social safety nets, paid for by "high" taxation levels

The other 3 were from Scandinavian countries...again, with those "high" taxation levels. Correlation isn't necessarily causation...but still, perhaps the two are connected?
 
a massive 16,000 person bureaucracy NEVER made anything cheaper. never. ever. and it never will

i have prefaced everything i have said here by saying i am not an expert in the health care field and i don't pretend to be. i take what i see, hear, experience, and read, and i make judgements. just like the rest of you do.

i have never said the US is the perfect health care system, i have never said it should be entirely for profit, or that we should turn canada into an entirely for profit scheme. i don't know what the perfect balance is, but i know it isn't canada's system and i suspect very strongly it isnt harpycare.

no one can deny that a very sizeable chunk of health care techniques, drugs, and technologies originate in the US outside of gov't control.
 
no one can deny that a very sizeable chunk of health care techniques, drugs, and technologies originate in the US outside of gov't control.
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Of course they can't. The argument is whether or not those same advancements would occur in a single payer system that wasn't specifically designed for maximum profit.

Again, scientific progress has done just fine without a for profit motive in the past.
 
Bleedsblue&white said:
I am afraid that is all we have. We have allowed a system where an honest man cannot succeed in politics, a system where policy can be bought. There was a time it could have been fixed relatively pain-free, but that time is long gone. I can't remember who said it first (though I usually take credit for it), but "a person can be smart...but people are stupid."
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[video=youtube;Y_zTN4BXvYI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_zTN4BXvYI[/video]
 
MindzEye said:
Of course they can't. The argument is whether or not those same advancements would occur in a single payer system that wasn't specifically designed for maximum profit.

Again, scientific progress has done just fine without a for profit motive in the past.
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ok. on one hand you appear to be admitting here that many of those advancements DO occur in the american system, on the other you appear to be denying that the makeup of that system had much to do with it. right.
 
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