How Can One Possibly Support Obama's Economic Policies? - Page 9

Wrong. But maybe we should give it a try first before declaring it a failure.



You are simply wrong that substantial cuts in the federal budget and reducing the federal government to its constitutional limits, would require cutting things like law enforcement and defense.

Yes. And soon I hope. One has to wonder why this is such a concern. I mean I know it sounds really evil as if to imply "get rid of the Department of Education in America" is the same as "get rid of education in America." But only someone who is uneducated would fall for that fallacious reasoning. The bottom line is that Ron Paul's position (correctly I might add) is that the Department of Education is in no way, shape or form a responsibility of the federal government. This statement probably applies to more than half and perhaps closer to 80% of what the federal government presently does.



I'm pretty sure that's only your characterization of what his policies would result in.

I wasn't talking about him.

You mean the regulations that resulted in the Upper Big Branch mine disaster, the BP oil spill disaster, corporate mismanagement at Enron, AIG, GM, Goldman, Lehmann... those regulations?


The DOE that's resulted in the US falling behind Finland, Korea, Canada, Hong Kong, China, Netherlands, Liechtenstein, Japan, Australia, Switzerland, Iceland, New Zealand, Denmark, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Ireland, Sweden, Austria... 28th in the world in math, 29th in problem solving, 18th in literacy... the same DOE that provided your education, perhaps?


These aren't the only areas of medical care for which the free market "works", it's just the most obvious example of a field not bound up by the demands of insurance companies. The free market "works" every time it's tried.

Free markets require competition. Competition increases efficiency and lowers costs. Consumers love competition. Businesses hate competition. Despite Congress's Constitutional authority to "regulate commerce among the states", they deliberately chose to shut down debate requiring insurance companies to sell their products across state lines, reducing or eliminating competition for their products. Care to guess why?

Whenever government makes insurance compulsory, costs increase. Obamacare makes insurance compulsory. Conclusion...?


Obama intends to make the US a third world nation. Problem solved.

Humor aside, nice sentiment, but demands won't make it so.

Like a man, a country doesn't get what it "deserves". It gets what it can effectively implement by inspiring the people who comprise the nation to solve the problems they're facing, for everyone's mutual benefit. Centralized top-down control has failed to do so for eons. This experiment will fail, as predictably as those that have failed before us.

A government cannot make medical care cheaper by fiat, just as it cannot make itself more prosperous by printing money. As for its other tasks, the DOE has failed to implement quality education, burdensome regulations have failed to prevent cataclysmic economic collapse, Homeland Security has failed to prevent terrorist attacks, the EPA has failed to prevent environmental disasters, and a central bank charged with stimulating economic growth while preventing boom/bust cycles has utterly failed to do so.

Get rid of them. All of them.

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http://www.pisa.oecd.org/dataoecd/1/63/34002454.pdf

I mean the regulations that would definitely have stopped all of those things had Republicans (and Clinton) not been furiously deregulating since Reagan.

Guess what... every single one of those countries and territories you've listed... has a national department overseeing standards of education (and most have outlawed home schooling). The only countries without a national department overseeing education are lower on the list than the US. In which direction on the list do you think the US would go if we privatized curriculum management?

Show me. Show me one single country with a freer market than the US that has a higher average standard of living. Show me how "free market works every time it's tried".


Except when companies are deregulated and able to collude freely, especially in a market where consumers have no choice not to enter into.

Wrong. Why is the US the most expensive place in the world to get insurance? It's not because insurance is compulsory here. Why is it that in countries where insurance is compulsory, the cost of healthcare is far, far cheaper than it is in the US, if what you say is true?

Look at third world nations. Do they have less or more regulation and social policy than the US? Look at countries where the standard of living is higher than the US. Do they have less or more regulation and social policy than the US? There's your answer, unless you're ignorant.

If that's your sense of humor, um... well... I just have no response.

The rest of your post is just rehashing the same failed arguments. Every time you look at Europe, you find a better situation than the US, THANKS to Socialism. Every time you look at a country that has weak social policy, you see failure. I can't understand how you possibly don't see that.

So they have less freedom. Sounds great to me.



Up.

I think you missed the part where these places with "less freedom" have higher rated education than the US. Here's the relevant part:

The only countries without a national department overseeing education are lower on the list than the US.

Yeah, that's logical!

Consumer electronics. Computers. Software. Food. Clothing. Housing. These are markets while each to one degree or another does have government regulation and intervention they are all generally substantially lower than in health care.



Lack of competition.



It's not. You're being lied to. The cost is simply hidden and disguised or born in other non-monetary ways.



If only it were so simplistic. It's not. You're the one who's ignorant on this subject.



Perhaps because he's looking deeper than the superficial and apparent or proximate causes to the real root causes of things and you're not.

I think you missed the part in logic class where correlation does not mean causation.



It actually is, but you won't see it because your so confused by the trees you cannot see the forest. This is a common problem among "liberals" (who don't actually like liberty) and "progressives" (who aren't actually advocating policies that will help us progress forward) and socialists such as yourself.

And the US is doing so well internationally in those markets against countries with more regulation! Not.

That would make sense if when you compare the prices in the US to prices in other countries, those other countries with cheaper health care had more competition in the US. Hint: They do not.

Actually, the place where the health care is being "hidden" is only in the profits of insurers and shareholders. To the average Joe on the street, they actually pay FAR less money out of their pocket, including in their taxes, etc. And that's what's important. I don't have to protect the obscene profits of the super-wealthy, at the cost of the man on the street, TYVM.

And once again you fail to see the wood for the trees.

The real costs of things in the US are inflated because of obscene greed and profits. Period.

And I think you missed the part in the theory of theory where a theory is just a theory until it's proven. I'm not going to conduct a theoretical experiment in economics in my fucking country when all signs are that it's going to fail. In this way, I'm far more conservative than you, as I will only support policy that has a proven track record. Once again, I'm asking you -- begging you -- to show one example where your theories have been put into practice and worked.

Yes.



Again, you're being misled by your inability or unwillingness to look beyond the superficial. Try it sometime, you'll be surprised what you learn.



Right. Do you know what the average profit margins in health care and health insurance are?


That's what you see. Again you are missing the part you're not seeing.


No. Not "period." You really don't know what you're talking about on this subject. That has become more and more obvious with each post you make on it. Sad really. You could educate and inform yourself beyond your extremely superficial understanding and yet it appears you refuse to. Sad.

All evidence to the contrary I guess.

Let me guess... a lie?

Or do you mean the profits AFTER billionaire doctors and health care administrators take their "fair" cut?

So you don't then. OK. I figured.


Billionaire doctors? Billionaire health care administrators? You're really going off the rails now.

Completely off the rails:

Are you serious? You know billionaire was an exaggeration, right?

Now...

Which country has the highest paid doctors in the world? Care to guess?

So then what other "exaggeration" are embedded in your posts?


I'd guess the US. But I don't know off the top of my head.

Yep.

Yes. From my calculations there are 3 zeros missing from those numbers.

Good guess.

From my calculations there is 99% brain mass missing from your skull.

And from your ethical point of view those numbers seem just fine.

Look tonton when you (and Wormhole and Mumbo Jumbo (appropriate named) and jimmac and BR) get all of your information and "knowledge" and "understanding" of the world from places like Huffington Post and Barack Obama's speeches and press releases, you're bound to be misinformed. A lot.

What are you conserving Mr. Conservative?

If they earned that compensation by freely competing on a free, open and voluntary market, then yes. If they've been able to "earn" that income because they are protected by a variety of government protections, regulations, cartelization and monopolization of the market, then no.

Health insurance cos enjoy a trust. They do not have to compete on the free market. Dems wanted to change this Cons said NO.

Huh. That sound like ad ad hom. Lemme guess, it's a liberal who's found someone they disagree with and they're unwilling to make rational, valid, relevant, fact-based and logical arguments in support of there view so...well...they resort to ad homs.

Actually, truth be told, almost all of those of us you've mentioned have actually lived outside of the US, and know how these things are in the real world. We also get all of our information from multiple sources, including places like the Cato Institute. What we don't do is limit our reading to the "approved Austrian Economists book of the month club."

We also observe. Not just theorize.

Exactly!



Well, that's a lie. But you're right about the first part.

Speaking and reading 3 languages is also extremely helpful when you want to get news from around the world. You should try it sometime MJ1870

Not very well or very deeply it seems.

You know, you say that an awful lot without a single source of backup. It's your default defense.

Really?
Passing-Health-Insurance-Industry-Fair-Competition-Act-will-break-monopoly-power-of-some-health-insurers

Well, let's just say we have a different perspective. I believe my perspective is more objective and informed. You apparently believe in conjecture spewed by an extremely singular ideological mindset.

Just trying to learn from you.
making rational, valid, relevant, fact-based and logical arguments is useless as response to your posts.
Boehner doesn't do it, Michele Bachmann, Palin, Gingrich, .... please link to one of their rational, valid, relevant, fact-based and logical arguments. Thanks.

Why didn't they do the simplest possible thing they could have if they really wanted to? Congress is more than willing to use the interstate commerce clause of the constitution to justify anything and everything whether actually related to commerce or not. The two simplest things they could have done here were:

- Dis-allow restrictions and prohibitions from selling insurance across state lines.
- Make health insurance benefits taxable income.

Both of these these things would have massively restructured the health insurance industry for much greater competition almost over night. No special bills that give the appearance of creating more competition or creating fake government managed competition. Real competition.

Try adding them up, sweety.