IS HEALTHCARE PERSONAL OR NOT? YOU BREAK IT - YOU OWN IT!

I don't usually find it necessary to divulge my personal life decisions to back up my opinions here on this blog. Usually I can find lots of other examples, facts, and opinions to support what I would like to share. But in the case of healthcare, I am going to share what this one woman's (my) life experience is to help support my argument. I'm doing this because I want the government to get out of my healthcare and stay out forever, amen.

Backing up a long way to when I was raised in a thriving middle class family in a small town, I will just say this: medical care was accessible and affordable, insurance was mostly for catastrophic circumstances, nursing care was wonderful, medical care was personal, and we knew who our medical professionals were. People did not go to the Dr. or the hospital unless there was a real need. By real, I mean something that could not be fixed with homeopathic remedies. The only checkups required had to do with schools for athletic participation. Vaccinations were required to participate in schools for the sake of eradicating infectious diseases. I knew of no one who could not afford or access healthcare if they needed it.

Flash forward to the 1970's. After Johnson in the '60's enacted Medicare and Medicaid, insurance rates rose and government regulations began to intervene in the medical profession. Granting that medical technology advancements would cause prices to rise somewhat, and inflation would effect the prices as well, the costs to families was still mostly within reach. The birth of my first child cost $185.00 for three days in the hospital in 1973. The entire price of bringing him into the world, including the preliminary pregnancy checkups was under $500.00.

Flash forward to 1986 when I had two young children and went through a divorce. From that point on, for 13 years, I lived without health insurance. By 1991 I owned a small business with 3 part-time employees, 2 full-time employees, and 50 independent sales reps who were commission only reps. There was no way at that time my business could afford a health coverage policy for such a small pool of employees. Insurance rates were escalating yearly. Even then, one could still afford, out of pocket, regular checkups. As I recall, during those 13 years. it was $18.00 to $24.00 to see the Dr. for a virus or a cold with a nasal infection. During those years I had a broken leg (can't remember the cost of that with emergency room and follow up care) and a minor surgery that cost around $2000.00. The most difficult of costs for me at the time were dental crowns that cost $300.00 per. I needed 3 of them during those years. I would have loved to have a "catastrophic" insurance policy with a high deductible of $5,000.00, or something like that, but could not find one that either existed or that I could afford. ( Being a person of faith, I'm sure the Good Lord protected me from that "catastrophe," so I could continue to raise my children and take care of my family.) Other than that concern of an unaffordable catastrophe, I was perfectly willing and happy to pay for all of my medical care out of pocket. I would still be happy to do that if the costs were still as affordable as they used to be.

Flash forward again to the early 2000's. The cost of going to the Dr. for a cold, infection, virus treatment, or non-life threatening events had gone up to over $60.00. (Now I think it might be $80.00 or more.) I married in 1999 and due to my husband's employer policy, I once again had insurance coverage. Dental crowns today are $800.00. (From $300.00 to $800.00 in less than 20 years' time. Whew!) Insurance rates are high and higher. What I could not pay for insurance earlier in my life is now only affordable because of employer co-pays in a larger insurance pool.

So what has caused the cost of medical care to go out of reach for most people? Someone please tell me? I'll give you my opinion.

One would expect some inflationary rises in medical care just because that exists in all of our monetary policies. You could look at supply and demand, with more people and fewer medical professionals. Those two aspects would increase prices to some degree, no doubt. Nothing costs the same as it did even a few years ago. But what would make healthcare unaffordable for most people. As you can tell from my story above, insurance was already out of reach for a relatively young small business owner by the 1990's. But in the 1950's, 1960's, and 1970's my Dad was a small business owner with under 4 employees and he could easily afford health insurance for his family.

Throw in all of the advances in medical technologies, the increasing population (demand), but then, throw in Medicare and Medicaid. Every medical bill you and I pay has built in it an increase to cover the costs of patients who are under those two programs. Every use of equipment has that built in cost as well. Yes, you might say, wait a minute, "Aren't people paying into those programs through taxes and withholding?" Obviously government programs have skewed the patient cost ratio because the answer to that is, "Yes, paying, but not covering enough." Why? We were in much better shape on medical expenses before Medicare and Medicaid. The government (Lyndon Johnson and Co.) wrecked the system. Medicare is a disaster in much the same way Social Security is a disaster due to demographics. The government socialist program of Medicare has done what all socialist programs do, i.e. intervene in the market in such a way as to make everyone miserably poorer.

Article from the Clinton era debate on government run healthcare.

"Let's go back to 1965, when Congress passed Medicare and Medicaid.

Most of the elderly already had health insurance. The poor were treated at city, county and charity hospitals. The right to emergency treatment, regardless of insurance, had been enacted under Eisenhower. Medical care was available to only slightly fewer people than now. But medical costs were less than half today's level - 5.9% of the economy.(1)

Since 1965, health costs have more than doubled, to 14% of GDP, and are projected to triple by the year 2000 (2). Government now pays over 43% of all medical costs (3) - and shifts billions more to private insurers. From a 1991 CBO report: Medicare was underpaying hospital average costs by 12%. Medicaid was underpaying hospitals by 12%., and paying doctors 31% less than Medicare rates. (4)

When government underpays, providers shift their costs to private insurers and cash customers."

Reason TV article on how Medicare and Medicaid caused the rise in health care costs.

"The rapid rise in health care costs is primarily the consequence of government policies."

It makes me think of the shopping admonition: "You break it, You own it." The progressive leftists live by that phrase. They break everything and then they own everything. But my healthcare is mine. I don't want some progressive leftist government bureaucrat making those decisions for me, or even knowing anything about me. They broke it. They should never be trusted with your healthcare or mine. Ever. They break everything. And they will break you and me and our nation with government run healthcare. They already have. The answer is to get them out of it. Pray for the Supreme Court to at least begin dismantling Obamacare and the progressive leftists' take over of your life and mine.

HOW GOVERNMENT HEALTHCARE MAKES YOU POOR -HOW MEDICARE MADE US WORSE OFF

If you are young, you might not understand the comparison I'm about to present. But, if you are young, you are already paying the price of communism in healthcare, whether you know it or not. Below is my simplistic explanation of how Americans are paying three times more for healthcare because of Medicare. Socialism ruins everything. Just wait as Obamacare gets implemented.

In the early 1960's, before the federal government inserted itself into our healthcare. Doctors were considered middle class or upper middle class, depending upon their specialties. Surgeons made more than general practitioners, for instance. Doctors were not in the stratosphere of income levels as they are today.

In my life up until then, I remember no one being denied healthcare. Health insurance for a family of four was under $50.00 per month, on the high side. Ours was $35.00. Most Dr.s visits were $15.00 to $20.00. And people didn't go to the doctor for every little hangnail, but went to the doctor for necessary treatments. Families took care of each other and their elderly relatives, and when medical care was needed it was usually affordable, barring some really long and dreadful circumstance. If the long and dreadful circumstance occurred, there were nets in place for the indigent to be cared for. The patient paid. Or the family paid. And if funds were depleted, local or state facilities were available. It is true that a long term disastrous health situation could financially hurt quite a lot. Families, churches, and charities stepped in and helped. In a smaller group of indigent patients with no support, the local and state tax supported hospitals took over.

Obviously, in any population some tragedies occur when it comes to health issues. Health insurance in those days was affordable and covered most all contingencies. People could cope. And they did. For the most part, we grew up knowing we could manage. That is how I remember it.

Enter Lyndon B. Johnson with his socialist "Great Society" schemes. Enacted in 1965, Johnson expanded the Social Security Administration to include healthcare for the elderly, adding the new Medicare program. The impact of this, as with most government socialist programs, came gradually. (The frog in boiling water analogy applies.) Immediately a new tax was added to payroll taxes for Medicare. Like Social Security, Americans now had to pay their entire lives into a system to cover healthcare when they turned 65 yrs. old. (now you can be in the U.S. for only 5 years and receive Medicare benefits.) History of Medicare

As implementation of Medicare permeated the healthcare industry, Dr.s receiving payment for Medicare patients did not get reimbursed by Medicare at the same costs as patients who were not on Medicare. In order to make up the difference, patient charges for all other patients were increased to cover the discrepancy. So you, as a working citizen began paying into Medicare, but also then began paying higher prices to go to the Dr. Voilá. You are, at that point, paying twice for Medicare...the payroll deduction and then the higher price at the Dr.'s office.

Oh, but that is just the tip of the iceberg. Medicare expansion continued. The government agency began covering equipment and all manner of other services. A lot of suppliers wanted in on the Medicare payments for healthcare. The price of equipment escalated right along with the Dr.s charges, nursing charges, hospital services, etc. Soon, as the Dr.s, hospitals, and equipment suppliers charged more to cover the discrepancies, health insurance rates began to increase for all others. All of these players felt justified increasing their rates and prices due to the government Medicare program insertion into the system.

Imagine the pebble thrown into a pond with ever expanding ripples. While Medicare covered X amount of a medical service, the doctors and service providers charged Y, so the insurance charged Z in order to cover both X, Y, and Z. Now you are paying three increases over what healthcare used to cost in America. And as this price escalation occurred exponentially over time, fewer and fewer people could afford health insurance and Dr.s charges for care. Dr.s are now in the income stratosphere, as one consequence. (aside: You are also paying for malpractice insurance that your Dr. is hit with thanks to the litigation happy society we live in.) Thank you Lyndon Johnson and your socialist Great Society Program. Wasn't that nice of him?

In short, Medicare caused healthcare prices to go out of reach for many, created an opportunity for fraud and abuse, made us all poorer, created an entire new dependency class, and generally made healthcare affordability worse for everyone. But wait, but wait...the socialists aren't done ruining things yet.....

(Personal anecdote: My son's birth cost a total of $185.00 in 1973. As Medicare costs filtered over the years down into the mainstream medical costs across the board, my son's first child cost $11,000.00 in 2003. In 30 short years the cost of bring a healthy baby into the world "necessarily skyrocketed, would you say?)

Not to be outdone by Lyndon Johnson, Obama magnified the cost of healthcare by such astronomical amounts that most Americans will be financially decimated by the weight of it.

Even prosthetics are taxed heavily as "medical devices." Wounded warriors are going to be taxed for artificial limbs. "If you have a fancy health care plan and pay as an individual, $10,200 or $27,800 for a family, you get to pay a 40% annual tax on those health care plans." Run Down of Tax Increases Because of Obamacare

Just as Medicare threw many people out of the insurance pool due to rising health insurance costs, Obamacare will throw more countless numbers of people out of the insurance pool and into poverty. Obamacare forces employers to stop healthcare benefits for employees due to the increased cost of it. The new cost of paying for employee healthcare is preventing employers from hiring. As more people are thrown into unemployment, more people are forced onto government programs, costing the American taxpayer even more. Obamacare taxes and fees for healthcare impact other aspects of our lives and makes the cost of living climb even higher. Our young heirs to our country have just been added to the dependency list and are made to pay for that privilege. Our heirs will have little chance of accumulating any wealth whatsoever as a consequence of Obama's nasty plans for them, and passed by a Socialist Democrat congress. Obamacare is just one of his guarantees of that. Believe me, Obamacare is not the only economic rape of this country, but it is one of his biggest.

Obama doubled down on Lyndon Johnson in the area of healthcare. Medicare was the tip of the sword, the camel's nose under the tent, the beginning of the end for affordable health care. Communism is so much fun, now isn't it?

Added information:
Heritage Foundation Obamacare Research
Reason.com on Obamacare
Obamacare Watch