patrick.net

HousingWatcher says

Where in the Constitution does Congress have the right to force people to buy a product from a private, for-profit corporation?

Commerce Clause. The same power that prevents you from growing a small amount of MJ in your basement is the same power that can force you to insure yourself.

The liberal majority knew this in Raich, which is why they voted on that as they did.

You believe in the government FORCING American citizens to purchase insurance from private companies

You bet your sweet bippy I do. Economists say we can't get something from nothing, but FORCING all Americans to carry coverage will over the long run take money out of the housing market and put it in the medical services sector.

Lower housing costs and healthier Americans. What's not to like?

tatupu70 says

If it’s not specified in the Constitution, then it’s not allowed….

Well, that actually isn't quite what their argument is. I believe in constitutional limits to the Fed's power. Like the 5-4 case the told the Congress that they couldn't pass a no-gun zone around schools.

Congress needs to focus on the big-picture stuff and not try to run states. I consider a national health insurance system big-picture enough.

Vicente says

If you want to be purist “anti-socialist” then you must avoid all insurance. After all it’s a sort of commune. You are pooling money to pay fora stranger’s illness when you are not ill. Properly speaking the Libertarian thing to do is either save money to pay for future illness, or visit a registered bookie every year that you are well, and make a bet that you will become ill in the coming year. If you remain well the bookie wins, if you become ill you…. errr win. The modern obsession with insurance is a bit odd you must admit, it floats a rather large administrative sector that contributes little.

I don't think anyone is arguing for pure socialism or pure anything else either. What I would like to see is voluntary socialism. If you want to buy something like insurance, buy it. If not then don't. Prepare for the consequences of your choice. Just don't let anyone choose how to spend your money for you.

AdHominem says

Vicente says

If you want to be purist “anti-socialist” then you must avoid all insurance. After all it’s a sort of commune. You are pooling money to pay fora stranger’s illness when you are not ill. Properly speaking the Libertarian thing to do is either save money to pay for future illness, or visit a registered bookie every year that you are well, and make a bet that you will become ill in the coming year. If you remain well the bookie wins, if you become ill you…. errr win. The modern obsession with insurance is a bit odd you must admit, it floats a rather large administrative sector that contributes little.

I don’t think anyone is arguing for pure socialism or pure anything else either. What I would like to see is voluntary socialism. If you want to buy something like insurance, buy it. If not then don’t. Prepare for the consequences of your choice. Just don’t let anyone choose how to spend your money for you.

So what should we do with the uninsured? Let them die? "Sorry sir, you chose not to be insured. This M.I./stroke/car accident/cancer/etc is gonna cost you likely X amount of dollars. And since you can't pay we are stopping care now. Enjoy the afterlife."

I'm an RN at a large university hospital and I'm imagining the conversations now. :O(

Leigh says

I’m an RN at a large university hospital and I’m imagining the conversations now. :O(

The basic problem is people think they're immortal. I know I did in my 20s when I didn't carry any insurance from 1992-1996. Never crossed my mind.

Making it optional just means people are free to rationally if riskily go uncovered, using the money to bid up housing instead. Free market fundamentalists see nothing wrong with that, but that's because they are fixated idiots.

"Making it optional just means people are free to rationally if riskily go uncovered, using the money to bid up housing instead. Free market fundamentalists see nothing wrong with that, but that’s because they are fixated idiots."

So you say we shoudl require everyone to buy insurance to keep housiong prices down? Well then let's keep houses down even further by madating that everyone buys a new car every year. Let's require everyone to go to college. Let's require everyone to buy bottled water. THere is NOTHING in the Constitution that allows Congress to have an inruance mandate. Why do you support a mandate? Do you have insurance company stocks in your portolio?

"You bet your sweet bippy I do. Economists say we can’t get something from nothing, but FORCING all Americans to carry coverage will over the long run take money out of the housing market and put it in the medical services sector.

Lower housing costs and healthier Americans. What’s not to like?'

Your idea will utterly fail. The fine is only going to be $750. That is compared to $4,000 + for an individual policy. People will just pay the fine. Drivers are required to have insurance but we all know uninsured drivers are on the road. Your idea of a mandate only benefits the insurance industry. Personally, I think linking an individual mandate to lower housing costs is insane. Housing will not be affected at all by it. In fact, if it is successful, the bill will actually INCREASE housing costs since people will not have to sell or go into foreclosure when their medical bills become overwhelming and the insurance company cancels their policy. Anyone who supports the mandate is a shill for the insurance industry.

HousingWatcher says

THere is NOTHING in the Constitution that allows Congress to have an inruance mandate.

Commerce Clause, look it up.

Why do you support a mandate?

I just said why -- health insurance is not an optional luxury, it is a necessity. I favor a single-payer system as can be found in Japan, Canada, and the other G-8 nations, BUT WE ARE TOO F----ING STOOPID as a nation to be willing to implement this.

No biggy. I've got mine, for now at least. $3000/yr. If everybody has to pay then there will be fewer people trying to get something for nothing and we all win.

HousingWatcher says

Anyone who supports the mandate is a shill for the insurance industry.

I would prefer single payer option, of course. But people like you are even MORE against that.

'tis a joke, this entire debate.

I am not a free market crazy. I support a public option.

One of the problems I see is that 80 y.o.'s think they are immortal, or at least their family members think so. We can keep death at bay for weeks on end given today's technology and advancements in medication ($$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$). As the boomers reach their 70's I predict many restrictictions on care. Ethics panels will be in high gear looking at co-morbidities (cardiac issues, cancers, diabetes, etc) and quality of life. Death, it's a fact of life.

Have the people above overlooked forced auto insurance????

It's not the Fed sitting on the money. It's banks. The money "sitting idle" is money that banks are not required by law to keep with the fed, but are choosing to anyway.

Federal Reserve profits are given to federal government, not distributed to banking shareholders beyond a very small amount.

Dude. Stop watching Glenn Beck.

jackoByte says

Have the people above overlooked forced auto insurance????

My father-in-law sells insurance in Alabama. He can always tell when some one's drivers license is up for renewal because they come in to by auto insurance. Then they drop it the next month.

I theorize that forced auto insurance was pushed through by those that sell auto insurance...really?!?! Kind of like what's happening on Capitol Hill with health care. And that ain't gonna work either. Get private insurance out of the equation and see what happens.

Auto insurance is not forced since you dont have to buy it if you don't drive. There is an option NOT to buy it. With the health insurance mandate, there is no such option.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/EXCRESNS?cid=123

The fed's actual balance sheet is a bit more worrying.

As I read somewhere, the Fed is not going to wind its balance sheet down, its balance sheet is going to wind IT down.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN2554239320100225

The Fed has printed nearly $1.25T of money to buy agency MBS, essentially replacing China and the Fortune 500 as the bagholder of these formerly money-good instruments.

The public option is not an option at all. You will be required to buy into the feds system if you fail to find coverage on your own. In the current bill a self employed person that changes his plan would be required to join the so called "option" at what ever price/coverage they will dream up. I'm not for any goverment option
it will cost more for everyone...paying for thousands more government employees saleries and pensions.

beershrine says

The public option is not an option at all. You will be required to buy into the feds system if you fail to find coverage on your own. In the current bill a self employed person that changes his plan would be required to join the so called “option” at what ever price/coverage they will dream up. I’m not for any goverment option
it will cost more for everyone…paying for thousands more government employees saleries and pensions.

All available evidence to the contrary. The US currently spends by FAR AND AWAY the most per capita on health care and enjoys somewhere below average results.

nevermind

"I’m not for any goverment option
it will cost more for everyone…paying for thousands more government employees saleries and pensions."

So you would rather pay the million dolalr salaries of insurance executives?

CEO of Wellpoints's Salary: $9.8 million

Anthem Blue Cross CEO Salary: $42.5 million

MAssachusetts Blue Cross CEO salary: $4.3 million

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-blumenfield-md/huge-compensation-package_b_464678.html

I dare you to find me a govt. burrecrat who makes anywhere close to these salaries.

Aetna CEO Ronald Williams: $24 million ($467,000 per week)

Cigna, H. Edward Hanway: $12,236,740
Coventry, Dale Wolf: $9,047,469
Health Net, Jay Gellert: $4,425,355
Humana, Michael McCallister: $4,764,309
U. Health Group, Stephen J. Hemsley: $3,241,042

http://www.healthreformwatch.com/2009/05/20/health-insurance-ceos-total-compensation-in-2008/

Man you add those salaries up and you're getting into some serious money. $120M is 600 bureaucrat's salaries.

Private health insurance is just make-work for paper pushers. Libertarians only defend it because they know they are on the losing side of the argument and it's the last card left in their anti-gummint deck.

And just think about how much insurance and pharmaceuticals spend on marketing/advertising! Add that to the overhead. I'd love to see those numbers.

They gotta pay someone to send out all those denial letters.

Leigh says

So what should we do with the uninsured? Let them die? “Sorry sir, you chose not to be insured. This M.I./stroke/car accident/cancer/etc is gonna cost you likely X amount of dollars. And since you can’t pay we are stopping care now. Enjoy the afterlife.”

I had a conversation much like this with a lovely young woman - under 30 years old - who made a poor choice an blew out her liver. She didn't qualify for Medicare (you have to be disabled two years) and she didn't qualify for Medicaid. She didn't have any money and wasn't placed on the transplant list.

She died.

Leigh says

Add that to the overhead. I’d love to see those numbers.

MRK

2008 Sales: $24B
Cost of goods sold : $5.5B
R&D: $5B
Overhead: $7.5B
Income Tax: $2B
Shareholder Profit: $8B

So on a $25 prescription, the pills cost $5 to make, $5 to develop, $7.50 to sell, and $8 for the shareholders.

Whattacountry.

I think Patrick is a swell guy. I have noticed a bit of rewriting, but that's acceptable behavior for any blog owner. Shucks, I do it too sometimes.

Over all, patrick.net is one of the best sites on the web and being retired at the old age of 54- forced you may say, I find his site to pack more bang for the buck that those other wimpy sites that promise, but just don't deliver.

And as a former California property owner and now exile living in the Wisconsin countryside, I get a kick out of watching the destruction of the 49r state from afar.

Keep up the good work Patrick, and stay forever young.

peace out

The little guy,

Gotham Wisconsin

Blue Swan says

We are really close to a huge labor shortage. The only thing that is about to inflate is salaries. Goods and houses will remain stable or fall. The Banks need money so companies can start paying their workers more.

Huh? What reason can you possibly give that we're going to have a labor shortage? Retirement of baby boomers? Hah. Boomers can't afford to retire any more. They will keep working until they die. You've heard of the "glass ceiling" for women. Young workers are going to experience the "grey ceiling".
Unemployment is rampant and not improving (look for census hiring to depress the numbers in coming months but it's an illusion). There is major overcapacity all over the economy. I don't see a wage-price spiral coming.
The banks are sitting on cash because they don't want to lend and no one wants to borrow. Also, they know how much trash is on their books and they're holding cash to offset expected losses.

yeah, this "labor shortage" thing is funny.

That's the problem with a 70% service-sector economy.

Gummint on all levels is allegedly going to spend $6.5T this year. Divided by $100K each, that SHOULD be SIXTY-FIVE MILLION jobs, 25 million public sector jobs and 40 million government-funded jobs like defense.

W T F

Is government going to grow more ? ? ? I'm the opposite of a tea party type but damn.

How about defense? We going to continue spending $700B/yr there? At $100,000 per job that's SEVEN MILLION jobs.

Agriculture? Mining? Forestry? Are there new jobs in the primary sector?

Manufacturing? R&D? I hope so, but the trend isn't our friend here.

How about wages? Is the US and the third world going to meet in the middle? Our minimum wage is $7.25, China's minimum wage is 65c.

Sure, we've got a lot of demand for piano teachers, artists, football players, astronauts, home flippers --- BUT THESE AREN'T WEALTH CREATION. THEY ARE CONSUMPTION.

The govt. can almost always do things cheaper. I just sent a letter through Fed Ex and it cost $18. Silly me, I could have sent it through the post office for $4.50.

elliemae says

WillyWanker says

Patrick’s claim to ‘honesty’, after writing that sad and (obviously) desperate ‘Glenn Beck Vicious Rumor’ thread, is tenuous at best. It’s support for 0bamaCare, like that, that netted the Senate a man like Scott Brown.

And yet, you’re reading this forum, owned by a sad and obviously desperate man. What’s that say about you?
“Tongue in” what? I need a moment…

I don't know if you have noticed, but I have posted @ 120 comments, while YOU, on the other hand, are fast approaching 1400. Regardless of how you or I feel about Patricks 'honesty', or lack thereof, anyone who spends most of their waking hours posting on a message board deserves some sort of 'honorable' mention. Your 'utter devotion' to Patrick could be construed, by some, as pathological.

Talk about 'sad' and 'desperate'. To say nothing of PATHETIC.

HousingWatcher says

I just sent a letter through Fed Ex and it cost $18. Silly me, I could have sent it through the post office for $4.50.

Bad comparison. FedEx is prohibited by law from directly competing with the USPS, and the latter has bulk mailing to support its infrastructure.

HousingWatcher says

“I’m not for any goverment option

it will cost more for everyone…paying for thousands more government employees saleries and pensions.”
So you would rather pay the million dolalr salaries of insurance executives?
CEO of Wellpoints’s Salary: $9.8 million
Anthem Blue Cross CEO Salary: $42.5 million
MAssachusetts Blue Cross CEO salary: $4.3 million
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-blumenfield-md/huge-compensation-package_b_464678.html
I dare you to find me a govt. burrecrat who makes anywhere close to these salaries.

You must be shaking in your boots for all the value in stock these guys have.
Thats right those numbers you have are on paper and
next week it could be worth little. I'm not denying these companies overpay
I was just stating the obvious...The Healthcare bill is not sustainable and will
run massive deficites just like SS, post office, medicare....and the insurance
companies will get RICHER ! & we will get less for our money.

as for paying for the 1000's of lawyers in washington here you go:
make sure to look at the benefits and bonuses

http://swz.salary.com/salarywizard/layouthtmls/swzl_compresult_national_EX05000047.html

beershrine says

The Healthcare bill is not sustainable and will
run massive deficites just like SS

SS was in surplus since the 1983 Greenspan Commission tax adjustment.

As for the post office and medicare, nothing higher taxes can't fix.

and the insurance
companies will get RICHER ! & we will get less for our money

If that comes to pass then we can just nationalize the insurance sector and put them out of business.

Think, people. This is a democracy. We have the power, or would, if 30-40% of this country weren't complete retards.

jackoByte says

Have the people above overlooked forced auto insurance????

You are only "forced" to carry auto insurance if you DECIDE to drive. With that, you still have a choice, not so with forced healthcare insurance. Furthermore, driving a car is not a "right" it is a privilege, so the two aren't even close as far as comparisons.

Blue Swan says

Troy says

Sure, we’ve got a lot of demand for piano teachers, artists, football players, astronauts, home flippers — BUT THESE AREN’T WEALTH CREATION. THEY ARE CONSUMPTION.

The thing is, employees are sort of like the houses. It’s very much a step function. If there are 10 houses and 9 families, the price of the 10th house is zero. If there are 10 houses and 11 families, the price of the 10th house is infinity.
Same with companies and employees and the people who the employees pay.
So, I expect to see the shortage all at once, zero to 60 (K) in seconds…

Today, people can move thousands of miles on short notice to fill jobs. It's not like the old days when you lived in a Company Town and had to accept whatever the Company offered and vice-versa. Heck, even someone on welfare can afford a bus ticket to another town/state if there's a job to be had.

You still haven't explained where the jobs are going to come from that will need to be filled????

I was born and raised in Minnesota. Had lots of jobs as a teen. Mostly consisted of shoveling the "white stuff" in the winter.

jvolstad says

I was born and raised in Minnesota. Had lots of jobs as a teen. Mostly consisted of shoveling the “white stuff” in the winter.

I used to sell cocaine also in Minnesota. My Svenska relatives look down upon it though.

Don't forget when that article was published, there wasn't even HTML 3.0 standards.
Most text on the internet was read via Usenets newsgroups. Which was clunky to read through.
And as for the ebooks for documentation, I don't know about you, but I hated it.
Most computers were only 600X800 max resolution, on a CRT monitor. So there was a lot scrolling to read a minimal amount of Text.

Any and all visions of what the internet would be one-day, was over shadowed by the oppressive speed of 14.4 dial up modems.

I did envision a fast internet where gaming and video would viable.

I'm still no fan of reading the amount of reading required for reading a book, electronically.

Small amounts of facts from this page or that page, I'm fine with. I hate having to read a book or a long white paper.

Clifford Stoll was something of a professional crank in the mid-90s, after he had reached a modicum of professional popularity with the semi-gripping story of tracking down a hacker intruder at Lawrence Livermore.

As it stands now, buying digital books is still something of a niche, 15 years after the article. Politics on the web is a joke, just look at this site. So he was half-right.

Stoll basically missed the potential rise of amazon, google, wikipedia, and travelocity et al. Salespeople are a means of intermediation, but after enough capital investment a more effective replacement for some areas was created.

Stoll was probably 100% correct about computers in schools. Computers are tools, not panaceas.