- Joined
- Mar 21, 2016
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- Charleston, SC
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- Libertarian - Left
I had a thought the other day about a way to possible move the U.S. to a system that would be half what we currently have under the ACA, and half single payer that would allow for a major reduction in what people pay for deductibles and premiums in general. The idea is that private insurance would only cover health care expenditures of less than X amount per year, or potentially X amount for an individual lifetime total. If the health care costs of an individual ever exceeded that X(which could be let's say 1 million dollars hypothetically just to give it a number) then the government would step in and take over.
The idea here being that private insurance would primarily only be designed for relatively simple things like, if you break your arm, or tear your ACL. Things that are expensive enough that you'd want to be covered against, but not so ridiculously expensive that it would likely bankrupt you. The government single payer system would then be used primarily for the worst cases only. Things like your kid getting leukemia. You're entire family getting in a bad car accident.
This would allow private insurance companies to drastically reduce their premiums and or the deductibles people have to pay knowing that they would never end up being on the hook for a lifetime of cancer treatments or something ridiculous like that. Obviously it would require some additional taxes to cover the government side of things.
I look at it sort of how we do major disaster type stuff. Most people have homeowners insurance, but at the same time if a hurricane, tornado, massive flood, or earthquake came along and destroyed an entire town, the government declares it a disaster area and gives aid above and beyond that.
Discuss.
The idea here being that private insurance would primarily only be designed for relatively simple things like, if you break your arm, or tear your ACL. Things that are expensive enough that you'd want to be covered against, but not so ridiculously expensive that it would likely bankrupt you. The government single payer system would then be used primarily for the worst cases only. Things like your kid getting leukemia. You're entire family getting in a bad car accident.
This would allow private insurance companies to drastically reduce their premiums and or the deductibles people have to pay knowing that they would never end up being on the hook for a lifetime of cancer treatments or something ridiculous like that. Obviously it would require some additional taxes to cover the government side of things.
I look at it sort of how we do major disaster type stuff. Most people have homeowners insurance, but at the same time if a hurricane, tornado, massive flood, or earthquake came along and destroyed an entire town, the government declares it a disaster area and gives aid above and beyond that.
Discuss.